Federal Jury Awards Oilfield Worker $30 Million for a Frac Tank Explosion

In December 2019, Steve Straughen was standing on top of a frac tank at a well pad in Weld County, Colorado, near the intersection of County Roads 90 and 35. The tank was supposed to store water and oil safely. Instead it exploded, launching him roughly 27 feet sideways and about 10 feet into the air.

Straughen, an Air Force veteran and father of two, was 36 at the time and absorbed the full force of the blast. He broke his right ankle, his right knee, his left hip, his pelvis, several ribs, and his jaw. He spent years in rehabilitation trying to save a badly damaged foot. Doctors eventually amputated part of his leg, and he still faces knee and hip replacement surgery.

The tank had been delivered by BHS, a field services company owned by DHI Energy Service. Kurt Zaner of Zaner Harden Law argued the equipment was defective. The complaint alleged that pinholes in the steel and poorly maintained equipment let oxygen mix with the volatile vapor inside, and a nearby burner ignited the mixture. "The tank company had one and only one job, and that was to deliver a vapor-tight tank," Zaner told reporters. "And they didn't do that."

The case went to trial in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado in Denver. Over roughly nine days, jurors reviewed the engineering evidence and Straughen's medical record, weighing what he would need across roughly 40 more years of life before settling on a figure.

In February 2024, the jury returned $30 million. The award broke down into $10 million for lost income and medical costs, $5 million for physical impairment and disfigurement, and $15 million for pain, suffering, and mental anguish.

The $15 million pain-and-suffering figure did not survive intact. Colorado caps noneconomic damages in personal injury cases under a statute that dates to the 1980s, and the court was required to reduce that portion of the verdict. The court granted Straughen's motion to apply the higher cap, leaving $936,030 of the $15 million jurors had assigned for his pain. The jury had also placed 80 percent of the fault on the tank maker, 15 percent on Straughen's employer and 5 percent on a supervising company, so the tank maker's share of the economic and impairment awards came to $8 million and $4 million. The judgment entered was $12,936,030 plus interest and costs.