(Bloomberg) –- Oklahoma’s Supreme Court said New Dominion LLCcan be sued for damage caused by an earthquake that a woman blameson disposal wells tied to fracking, in what may be the first suchcase to head to a jury trial.

Sandra Ladra sued New Dominion and Spess Oil Co. for injuriessuffered to her knees and legs in November 2011, when a 5.0magnitude earthquake struck near her home in central Oklahoma. Shesaid the tremor caused the rock facing on her two- story fireplaceand chimney to fall into the living room, where she was watchingtelevision with her family.

Oklahoma, a region not known for seismic activity, hasexperienced a rash of earthquakes since 2009, the same year areaoil companies began using hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, toshatter deep rock layers to extract oil and gas. Fracked wellsproduce large quantities of wastewater, which drilling companiesinject into ultra-deep disposal wells, which critics blame forcausing earthquakes.

Richard Andrews, Oklahoma’s state geologist, published a studyin April concluding it’s “very likely” the 600-fold increase inearthquake activity experienced in some parts of the state wastriggered by the injection of wastewater in disposal wells ratherthan by the fracking activity itself.

Quake rate

Oklahoma’s earthquake rate has increased from 1.5 temblors ayear before 2008 to an average rate of 2.5 a day, Andrews said inthe April 21 report.

Since 2011, more than 20 lawsuits have been filed againstcompanies including BHP Billiton Ltd., Chesapeake Energy Corp.,Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Sunoco Logistics Partners LP that allegeunderground injection activities caused earthquakes in Arkansas andTexas, according to a tally of cases compiled by BloombergIntelligence.

A July 2014 study published in the journal Science found thatfour high-volume disposal wells owned by New Dominion on theoutskirts of Oklahoma City may have accounted for 20 percent of allseismic activity in the central U.S. from 2008 to 2013.

David J. Chernicky, chairman and founder of New Dominion, hassaid the evidence tying underground wells to earthquakes isunreliable. He was dismissive of Ladra’s lawsuit in an interviewthis year and expressed confidence New Dominion will prevail.

‘About science?’

“I deal with science,” he said. “That’s what this will come downto. Is it about science? Or is it about emotion?”

New Dominion, based in Tulsa, and Spess Oil didn’t immediatelyrespond to phone messages seeking comment on the suit. Robert Gum,New Dominion’s lawyer, also didn’t immediately return a callseeking comment.

“Decades of scientific research have demonstrated that inducedseismicity only occurs under specific and rare circumstances,”Steve Everley, a spokesman for Energy In Depth, a research programfunded by the Independent Petroleum Association of America, said inan e-mail Wednesday.

Everley said the industry disputes links between quakes and thewastewater wells, which have been used in that region for ageneration.

“Underground wastewater injection has been safely occurring inOklahoma and across the country for at least a century, andproduced water volumes were higher in Oklahoma in the 1980s thanthey are today,” he said.

Harold Hamm

The legal fight over fracking-related activities and earthquakesin Oklahoma now includes Harold Hamm, the chief executive officerof Continental Resources Inc. Hamm filed a state court defamationlawsuit Friday against a man who accused him in a Facebook postingof trying to “squelch” a study on the state’s earthquakes,according to a complaint.

In Ladra’s case, the Oklahoma Supreme Court reversed a trialcourt’s ruling that the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, whichregulates the energy industry, has exclusive jurisdiction overcases concerning oil and gas operations.

The regulatory body “is without authority to hear and determinedisputes between two or more private persons or entities in whichthe public interest is not involved,” the high court said in itsdecision Tuesday.

Stating that a public-rights dispute “must arise betweengovernment and others,” the court found the commission “is withoutthe authority to entertain a suit for damages.” It ordered thestate district court to proceed to weigh the merits of Ladra’sargument.

First jury

Her lawsuit is the first of its kind headed toward a jury trial,according to a lawyer for Ladra.

Scott Poynter, a spokesman for the injured woman and herattorney, said Ladra’s case will “be stuck for a while” if the oilcompanies ask the court for reconsideration. Similar cases inArkansas and Texas didn’t make it as far as jury trials, hesaid.

“People like to say these cases are about fracking, but it’sabout a byproduct of fracking,” he said Tuesday in a phoneinterview.

Poynter said Ladra, 64, has been told she may need knee-replacement surgery.

The case is Ladra v. New Dominion LLC, SD-113396,Supreme Court of the State of Oklahoma (Oklahoma City).

--With assistance from Mark Chediak and Benjamin Elgin in SanFrancisco.

Copyright 2018 Bloomberg. All rightsreserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten,or redistributed.