Burns family sues U.S. ski resort claiming hot chocolate was too hot

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LOS ANGELES -- A family is suing a U.S. ski resort claiming the hot chocolate it sold them was too... hot.

The lawsuit in California says that when Brittany Burns and Joshua Moran Burns took a mid-morning break from skiing with their five-year-old daughter, they stopped for a drink at a cafe at the swanky Heavenly Mountain Resort.

The suit alleges that after spraying whipped cream on top of the beverage, the server slid the drink “directly to the minor” without a lid.

When the child tried to drink it, the “excessively and unnecessarily hot” liquid spilled inside her ski suit, scalding her chest and abdomen.

The complaint, which seeks damages for medical expenses, loss of past and future income and “loss of enjoyment in life,” claims the resort and its staff were negligent.

They “knew and should have known that such hot beverages posed a great hazard of causing just this type of incident and injuries.”

Roger Dreyer, a personal injury attorney in Sacramento who is representing the Burns family, said the youngster has been left with permanent scars from the incident, which happened two years ago.

He said while people going to ski resorts assume a level of risk because of the sport, this case is different.

“You’re not assuming they’ll cook the hot chocolate to a temperature that’s not consumable to a human being,” he said, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

There was no immediate response to an AFP request for comment from Vail Resorts, the company that owns Heavenly Mountain.

Lawsuits that claim hot drinks are too hot are not uncommon in the litigious United States.

Last year Starbucks was ordered to pay a customer US$50 million for an injury related to a cup of tea.

That ruling was followed by at least two lawsuits lodged against the company claiming drivers had suffered injuries when drinks had slopped in their laps.

A landmark legal ruling against McDonalds in New Mexico in 1994 established something of a precedent for Americans suing fast food companies when 79-year-old Stella Liebeck was awarded over $2.8 million after spilling hot coffee on herself.

Although the award was reduced on appeal, the case has often been cited as an example of the need to reform U.S. tort law.