MEDIA – A contractor hired by Villanova University is facing a $1.3 million lawsuit from an insurance company over water damage at a construction site.
On April 29, Travelers Property Casualty Company filed suit against the school but also as subrogee of the school, seeking compensation for damage at a project on which Hunter Roberts Construction Group was working.
Hunter Roberts was hired for a project known as “Transforming the Campus” that entailed several improvements, but a July 2018 thunderstorm wreaked havoc with the campus as a result of the soil disruption that had occurred, the lawsuit says.
Water collected along the south wall of the Mendel Science Center and filled up a window well, it says.
The window broke and large amounts of water flooded the science center, the lawsuit says. The thunderstorm was a foreseeable event in the summer months, Travelers claims.
The Travelers policy with Villanova cost the school a $100,000 deductible. Repairs to the science center are estimated to eventually exceed $1.3 million, Travelers says.