ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses several current issues involving tort statutes of limitations, with particular reference to the interpretation and application of limitations periods with claim accrual keyed to plaintiff's actual or constructive "discovery" of their injury and its cause. While a claim asserting personal physical injury or risk thereof sounds in tort, and perhaps also implied warranty, a claim asserting only economic harm, that is, damage to a product or other property, but not posing an unreasonable risk of personal injury, may require application of a warranty limitations period. In some circumstances, a plaintiff's awareness of the substantial certainty that future harm will result is enough to trigger the running of the statute of limitations. Some jurisdictions have adopted the "reasonable possibility" test. Under this standard the statute of limitations begins to run when the plaintiff knew of or should have known of the "reasonable possibility" of the connection between the defendant's toxin and the claimant's injury or disease.
