Let’s hope that this $3 million award for fracking damages is the first of many more to come.
Texas-based Aruba Petroleum Inc. will have to pay nearly $3 million to a family for the harm that Aruba’s hydraulic fracturing — or fracking — operations caused, after what the plaintiffs’ attorneys are calling the first trial regarding fracking damages in the United States.
Attorneys for Bob and Lisa Parr said that the fracking operations in Dallas County, Texas, “fouled the family’s 40-acre ranch property, their home and quality of life, sickened them and their pets and livestock,” law firm Matthews & Associates said in a Wednesday blog post following the previous day’s decision.
The jury verdict includes $2 million for physical pain and suffering, plus money for property and market value loss, future pain and suffering and mental anguish, the firm said. The plaintiffs said emissions and discharges from the operations, including hazardous gases, chemicals and wastes, caused damage starting in 2008.
The disturbing thing is that this isn’t an isolated incident, as the fracking industry routinely causes such “physical pain and suffering…property and market value loss, future pain and suffering and mental anguish.” Perhaps the Texas jury’s award in the Parrs’ case will be a model for many more around the nation?
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