Oven Door Case Summary

A. According to the facts, Smith bought a stove that was manufactured by the ABC Company. Since he bought a stove it was certainly foreseeable that that he would use the stove to cook. Smith should have known that the intended use of a stove is to cook food. There was not any heat in Smith’s kitchen which is the reason why he had the oven door wide open. However, this brings to me to the question of why didn’t he just use a miniature personal heater and place it in his kitchen? The activity that Smith was engaged in (resting his feet on the oven door) was rarely foreseeable. Moreover, resting your feet on the inside of an oven door is considered a highly dangerous and irresponsible activity. It is predictable almost to a certainty foreseeable that a possible injury could occur when someone is misusing a stove.

Why didn’t Smith think that the activity he was engaging in was dangerous? If Smith knew that he was going to use the stove for an unintended purpose why didn’t he think to bolt the stove down to the floor or to the wall in order to prevent it from falling forward? Why didn’t he think about how he was putting an uneven weight distribution onto the opening of the oven door? Was he sitting in the chair with his feet rested on the oven door for an extended period of time? If so, for how long? Why didn’t common sense tell him that he was engaging in a dangerous activity? Would a reasonably prudent person engage in the same dangerous activity of resting their feet on the opening of an oven