BILLINGS, Mont. — A federal appeals court has overturned a judge's finding that BNSF Railway contributed to the deaths of two people in a Montana mining town where thousands have been sickened by asbestos exposure.
Following a civil trial, a jury in 2024 awarded $4 million each to the estates of the two people who died in 2020. Their families blamed the railroad for allowing asbestos-contaminated mining material to accumulate in a rail yard in downtown Libby, Montana.
But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in an opinion issued Tuesday sided with BNSF, which argued it was required under law to accept the vermiculite material for shipment and had been told it was safe. BNSF is considered a ''common carrier'' under federal law because its services are offered to the general public, a status that shields it from some legal liabilities.
''The dangerous condition here — accumulated asbestos dust — arose solely from BNSF's operation as a common carrier executing its federally mandated duty to transport vermiculite,'' Judge Morgan Christen wrote in Tuesday's opinion. He added that BNSF was ''protected from strict liability by the common carrier exception.''
The case in Helena, Montana, was the first of numerous lawsuits against the Texas-based railroad corporation to reach trial over its past operations in Libby. Current and former residents of the small town near the U.S.-Canada border want BNSF held accountable for its alleged role in asbestos exposure that health officials say has killed several hundred people and sickened thousands.
U.S. District Judge Brian Morris had instructed the Helena jury that it could find the railroad negligent based on its actions in the Libby Railyard. The jury did not find that BNSF acted intentionally or with indifference, so no punitive damages were awarded.
The vermiculite mined in Libby has high concentrations of naturally occurring asbestos. It was used in insulation and for other commercial purposes in homes and businesses across the nation.
After being extracted from a mountaintop outside town, the material was loaded onto rail cars that sometimes spilled the contents in the Libby rail yard. Residents have described piles of vermiculite being stored in the yard and dust from the facility blowing through downtown Libby.
