When a Safety Shortcut Becomes a Nuclear Verdict

A serious workplace incident can change lives in seconds. It can also expose an organization to consequences far beyond the immediate injury. One of those consequences is a nuclear verdict, generally understood as a jury award of $10 million or more. These verdicts can be driven not only by the severity of an injury, but also by how a jury views an organization’s decisions, actions, and safety practices leading up to an incident.

Key Takeaways

Marathon Strategies’ 2026 Nuclear Verdict Report found that in 2025:

• 190 corporate cases resulted in verdicts of $10 million or more
• That represented a 40.7% increase from 2024
• Verdicts totaled more than $25.6 billion
• More than 68 industries experienced at least one nuclear verdict
• Workplace negligence was among the major drivers

Those numbers matter because nuclear verdicts are no longer limited to a handful of traditionally high-risk industries. According to Marathon Strategies’ 2026 Corporate Verdicts Go Thermonuclear report, employers across more than 68 industries experienced at least one nuclear verdict in 2025.

For employers, those verdicts reinforce why everyday safety decisions matter.

When a serious incident becomes a lawsuit, the question may no longer be simply: What happened? It may also become: What did the company know, what should it have known, and what did it do about the risk.

You May Not Control the Jury, but You Control Your Safety Practices

The report identifies several forces contributing to rising verdicts, including social inflation, juror attitudes, litigation financing and increasing anti-corporate sentiment.

Social inflation broadly refers to claim costs and jury awards increasing faster than normal economic inflation. Factors such as changing attitudes toward corporations, larger jury awards, and litigation trends can all contribute.

Employers have little control over those forces. They have much more control over what happens inside their own operations. After an incident, an organization may need to demonstrate that it:

• Recognized foreseeable hazards

• Established appropriate controls

• Trained employees

• Supervised the work

• Responded to known concerns

• Corrected unsafe conditions

In practical terms, a negligence allegation may come down to whether an employer knew, or reasonably should have known, about a hazard and what it did in response. That’s why the decisions made every day in the field matter.

A Policy Is Only as Strong as What Happens in the Field

Most organizations have safety policies and procedures. The real test is whether those expectations still hold when production is behind, equipment is down, conditions change, or, my personal favorite, someone says, “We’ve done it this way for years.”

That mindset is where shortcuts can take hold. If a task has been done the same way dozens of times without anyone getting hurt, it is easy to assume the risk is low. Over time, employees get comfortable with it, supervisors may stop questioning it, and the shortcut becomes part of how the job gets done.

The problem is that the absence of an injury does not mean the process is safe. One different condition, a piece of equipment fails, a load shifts, someone loses their footing, and suddenly the outcome is very different.

A written safety program is important.  But it has to match what is actually happening in the field. 

If the policy says one thing, but supervisors routinely allow something different, that gap matters. After an incident, the question will not only be what the policy said. It will also be what employees were actually expected and allowed to do.

Workplace Negligence Should Get Employers’ Attention

 The fact that workplace negligence is showing up as a major factor in nuclear verdicts should get the attention of both safety professionals and business leaders. Having a rule or procedure on paper is not enough. What matters is whether it is understood, followed, and enforced in the day-to-day work. 

 Negligence allegations may look at whether an employer:

• Provided appropriate training
• Maintained equipment
• Addressed recognized hazards
• Enforced its own procedures
• Adequately supervised employees
• Responded when unsafe conditions were identified

Documentation Matters, but Only if It Reflects Reality

Training records, inspections, job hazard analyses, corrective actions, maintenance records, and written procedures can all help show how an organization manages safety. But those records need to reflect what is actually happening in the workplace. 

Good documentation should be able to answer a few basic questions: 

• What hazard did we identify?

• What did we do about it?

• Were employees trained?

• Did supervisors follow up?

• Was the issue corrected?

• If the work could not be done safely, was it stopped?

The goal is not to create paperwork for the sake of paperwork. It is to create a clear record of how hazards were identified, communicated, and addressed. That is far more useful than trying to piece together what happened after someone is injured. 

Ask the Questions Before an Incident Does

Employers should regularly ask:

• Are our safety procedures realistic for the work employees actually perform?
• Do supervisors consistently enforce expectations?
• Do employees have the authority to stop unsafe work?
• Are changing conditions evaluated before work continues?
• Are hazards and corrective actions documented?
• When we identify a problem, can we show what we did about it?

These are not just OSHA compliance questions. They are business-risk questions.

A strong safety program can help reduce injuries, operational disruption, and claims. Just as importantly, it can help show that hazards were taken seriously before an incident occurred.

The Cost of a Shortcut Has Changed

The reach of nuclear verdicts should challenge the assumption that, “That kind of lawsuit doesn’t happen to companies like ours.” It can.

Employers cannot control social inflation, juror attitudes, or litigation trends. They can control how seriously hazards are taken, whether supervisors enforce expectations, whether employees are properly trained, and whether known problems are corrected. They can also make sure their documentation reflects a safety program that is active, consistent, and real.

After a serious incident, policies, training records, inspection reports, supervisor decisions, photographs, and past practices may all become part of the picture.

The work done before an incident matters.

McClone’s Safety Risk Management team works with employers to identify workplace exposures, strengthen safety programs, improve training and documentation, and address hazards before they become injuries or something much larger.