[Retric]

Are you trying to argue that 3rd degree burns over 5+% of your body is not somehow a serious medical issue? Or that being younger or heaver somehow adds protection to your skin?

As to water vs steam, steam has effectively a much higher heat capacity but far lower density. 90c water can cause 3rd degree burns in as little as 2 seconds but clothing generally extends the exposure duration significantly.

PS: In the end it was a low cost lawsuit which was settled for presumably less than 600k and well within the cost of doing business. They changed cup design not temperature, but that's about it. As far as their concerned the issue was not the actual cost but discouraging people from suing in the future as it's been 20 years without a repeat.

[emn13]

I'm saying quite the opposite: that the very seriousness of her injury was likely due to her age, not that she didn't have serious injuries. Her age would have made the accident more likely, would have slowed down her response to the accident (her own trial lawyers' evidence suggested she must have remained in the hot coffee for at least 12-15 seconds, not the 2 seconds you mention), and would have hampered her recovery (pretty much any injury is more serious in the elderly, and indeed wikipedia mentions it for burns too).

She didn't just have any old minor burn; hers was huge - she stayed for months in the hospital and lost 20% of her body mass; that's not your typical scalding accident.

Such lawsuits have been repeated, they just haven't been so successful. The fact that it's been 20 years merely underlines how unusual her circumstances were - and perhaps how bad that original cup design was.

[DanBC]

> Or that being younger [...] somehow adds protection to your skin?

Well, that's a reasonable point. Children and old people do have more fragile skin and are going to suffer more severe scalds because of this.