Estate of Madden v. Southwest Airlines, Co.

 Estate of Madden v. Southwest Airlines, Co.

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Carol Madden ("Ms. Madden"), on behalf of herself and the Estate of her deceased husband William Madden ("Mr. Madden") (collectively, "Plaintiffs"), sued Southwest Airlines Co. ("Southwest") asserting four negligence-based causes of action related to Mr. Madden's contraction of and subsequent death from COVID-19. ECF 1, ¶¶ 200-36. Southwest moved to dismiss. ECF 6. Plaintiffs opposed the motion, ECF 11, and Southwest replied, ECF 12. No hearing is necessary. See Loc. R. 105.6 (D. Md. 2018). For the reasons set forth below, Southwest's Motion to Dismiss will be granted and Plaintiffs' claims will be dismissed without prejudice.

I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND [*2] 

The following facts are drawn from Plaintiffs' Complaint and are taken as true for the purposes of this Motion to Dismiss. Ms. Madden is a flight attendant employed by Southwest. ECF 1 ¶8. The Federal Aviation Administration ("FAA") requires active flight attendants to attend Recurrent Training and to maintain a Certificate of Demonstrated Proficiency ("Certificate"). Id. ¶¶ 24-26. Southwest was therefore required to direct Ms. Madden to attend Recurrent Training to maintain her Certificate if she wished to continue her employment. Id. ¶ 28. Ms. Madden attended Recurrent Training on July 13, 2020, at the Baltimore Washington International Airport. Id. ¶ 31. The training involved groups of ten participant flight attendants at a time, including Ms. Madden, demonstrating various proficiencies such as the ability to use various safety devices onboard an aircraft. Id. ¶ 34.

During this training, Southwest allegedly failed to implement reasonable safety and health protocols to prevent the participant flight attendants from contracting or spreading COVID-19. Plaintiffs identify various alleged failings including: (a) failing to screen participant flight attendants in the training session for [*3]  COVD-19, (b) failing to screen instructors in the training session for COVID-19, (c) failing to exclude those that had been exposed to COVID-19, (d) failing to enforce mask policies that would have lessened transmission, (d) failing to implement safe distancing requirements, (e) failing to sanitize equipment in shared and common use, and (f) failing to implement contact tracing that would have prevented transmission after-the-fact or alerted participant flight attendants at an early time to COVID-19 exposure. Id. ¶ 204.

As a result of Southwest's failure to exercise a standard of care to prevent transmission of the virus, Ms. Madden was exposed to COVID-19 during the training. Id. ¶¶ 98-99. Two weeks following the training, a Southwest employee called Ms. Madden to inform her of the exposure at the training, but at that point both Ms. Madden and Mr. Madden had developed symptoms. Id. ¶ 138, 186. Indeed, approximately three days after the training concluded, Ms. Madden began experiencing increasingly more severe COVID-19 symptoms. Id. ¶ 101. Ms. Madden was in close contact with her husband, with whom she lived, ultimately transmitting COVID-19 to him. Id. ¶ 186. Mr. Madden began experiencing [*4]  symptoms approximately ten days after the training, before testing positive for COVID-19 on August 1, 2020. Id. ¶¶ 107, 145-48. Mr. Madden's condition rapidly deteriorated, and he ultimately passed away on August 12, 2020 due to complications from the COVID-19 virus. Id. at ¶¶ 142-75.

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