Delta Air Lines Inc. and its regional subsidiary Endeavor Air Inc. are urging a Georgia federal judge to hit the brakes on a fiery personal injury suit stemming from the harrowing crash of Delta Flight 4819 in Toronto earlier this year. The carriers want the case paused—or shipped to Minnesota—while a potential consolidation of lawsuits into a multidistrict litigation (MDL) unfolds.
A Tangled Legal Descent
In a motion filed Friday, the airlines argued that plaintiff Marthinus Lourens’ case is one of just two outliers not already under the jurisdiction of a Minnesota federal court, where 14 similar lawsuits are pending before the same judge. The carriers insist a stay would prevent legal turbulence by avoiding conflicting discovery efforts across multiple jurisdictions.
Lourens’ suit, filed just days after the February 17 crash, paints a terrifying scene: he claims he was violently tossed inside the aircraft, left dangling upside down in his seatbelt as fuel leaked onto him inside a burning plane. The Embraer 175 aircraft, operated by Endeavor, had just landed at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport after departing from Minneapolis with 80 people on board.
