$172 Million Settlement for 17,000 Victims of the 1988 Shell Norco Refinery Explosion

At 3:37 a.m. on May 5, 1988, a corroded eight-inch vapor line in a catalytic cracking unit at Shell Oil's refinery in Norco, Louisiana gave way. The resulting explosion killed seven Shell workers outright, injured dozens more, shattered windows thirty miles from the blast site, and forced approximately 4,500 residents to evacuate the surrounding Diamond community.

The force of the blast spread damage across both banks of the Mississippi River. Residents of Norco had endured eight evacuations over the prior twelve years from incidents at the same facility, and this one was far worse than anything before it. Within hours, attorneys had begun filing claims. Federal courts consolidated the wave of suits into a single class action, certified in November 1988, covering individuals and entities in the affected parishes who suffered bodily injury or property damage from the explosion and the 159 million pounds of toxic chemicals released into the air.

The class eventually numbered more than 17,000 plaintiffs. The litigation was managed by a Plaintiffs' Legal Committee (PLC) of eight attorneys, one of whom was Joseph Bruno of Bruno and Bruno in New Orleans. As a PLC member, Bruno worked alongside co-counsel to develop the liability theory, coordinate discovery, and prepare the case for trial against one of the world's largest oil companies.

After nearly five years of complex federal litigation, the parties reached a settlement agreement on June 9, 1993. Shell agreed to pay approximately $170 to $172 million to resolve the compensatory damage claims of the class. The settlement was preliminarily approved by the court under 812 F.Supp. 658, with the funds to be distributed among the thousands of claimants who had suffered personal injury or property loss in the disaster.

The case is formally recorded as In Re Shell Oil Refinery, Civ. A. No. 88-1935 (E.D. La. 1993). The Journal of Commerce reported the settlement under the headline 'Plaintiffs to Share Nearly $172 Million in Shell Settlement.' The Louisiana Supreme Court's 2007 disciplinary opinion in In Re Joseph M. Bruno independently confirms Bruno's appointment to the PLC and his active role through the settlement, which the court noted resolved the night before a critical evidence hearing was scheduled to begin.