Insurance — homeowner policies — pollution exclusions — bat guano

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Wisconsin Supreme Court

Civil

Insurance — homeowner policies — pollution exclusions — bat guano

Bat guano falls unambiguously within the term “pollutants” in a homeowner policy’s pollution exclusion.

“Bat guano, composed of bat feces and urine, is or threatens to be a solid, liquid, or gaseous irritant or contaminant. That is, bat guano and its attendant odor ‘“make impure or unclean”’ the surrounding ground and air space, see id. at 122 (quoting American Heritage Dictionary 406), and can cause ‘“inflammation, soreness, or irritability”’ of a person’s lungs and skin, see id. (quoting American Heritage Dictionary 954). See Wis. Dep’t of Health & Family Servs. in cooperation with the Agency for Toxic Substances & Disease Registry, Indoor Air and Health Issues: Bat Guano, Antigo, Langlade County, Wisconsin (June 9, 1998), http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/hac/pha/batg/bat_toc.html (concluding that ‘[p]eople who live around large quantities of bat wastes are more likely to become ill with histoplasmosis’; ‘[p]eople who contact mites that live in bat wastes may get skin rashes’; and ‘[m]olds that grow in moist, warm, highly organic situations may increase asthma attacks in affected people’). These points cannot be seriously contested by the Hirschhorns, who alleged in their complaint that the odor of bat guano was so ‘penetrating and offensive’ as to render their vacation home unfit to live in.”

Reversed.

2009AP2768 Hirschhorn v. Auto-Owners Ins. Co.

Ziegler, J.

Attorneys: For Appellant: Hirschhorn, Joel, Coral Gables, FL; For Respondent: Kurtz, Arthur E., Madison; Barber, Timothy M., Madison