The More Traffic an Establishment Has, the More Likely a Slip and Fall Is to Occur

Interviewer: Are there more common times of day that slips and falls occur or certain kinds of locations that are prone to accidents?

Stephen Boutros: The more traffic you have, such as a grocery store or something like that, the more likely that an accident will occur. It also depends on what you’re selling. Whatever the merchandise is or whatever is on the store shelves, then those factors play condition in increasing the likelihood that someone gets hurt.

Whenever you see any type of machinery that uses water, we see a number of people injured from slips and falls from water coming from air conditioning units or refrigeration units or vending machines. Whenever there’s machinery that uses water, it increases the likelihood of water somehow escaping it or that machine malfunctioning, water gets on the floor, and that’s very dangerous.

Many Slip and Fall Injuries Are Attributed to Water on the Floor

Water is clear, you don’t see it, and it’s slippery and if it’s on a surface, any type of tile or linoleum, you hit that water and you will fall. We see horrible injuries from slip and falls. Severe wrist injuries, shoulder injuries, thumb injuries, knee injuries, ankle injuries, and shoulder injuries from slip and falls.

There Are Severe Injuries Attributed to Falling Merchandise, Typically at the Large Retail Establishments

There are severe injuries attributed to fallen merchandise as well. Now that the large big box stores have become so popular, they receive heavy traffic from patrons and accidents do frequently occur.

These stores routinely are stocking, heavy merchandise up high above people. We see a lot of cases resulting from heavy merchandise. We are not talking about something that weighs a couple of pounds. We are talking about something that can weigh 10, 20, 30, 40 pounds, falling.

The force of something that big falling, depending on how far it falls, can kill people. You can also fracture your neck, sever spinal cords, and suffer from permanent paralysis.