Edwards v. National Coal Board

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Edwards v. National Coal Board was an important case in English case law. The 1949 case revolved around whether it was "reasonably practicable" to prevent even the smallest possibility of a rock fall in a coal mine.^[1]

This case established the concept of "reasonable practicability." The Court of Appeals decided that "reasonably practicable" was a more narrowly defined phrase than what was "physically possible." This allowed for the creation of equations that measured the risk present in a given situation against the reasonable practicability of mitigating that risk. In other words, the equation asked if averting the risk worth the effort it took to negate that risk.^[2]