A mass tort is a civil action involving numerous plaintiffs against one or a few corporate defendants. The tort may involve, for example, personal injuries suffered by numerous plaintiffs as a result of a defective product, or a mass disaster in which there were many injured persons, such as an airplane crash, or exposure of a large group of people to toxic chemicals or pharmaceuticals.
Lykens is a borough in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, 30 miles (48 km) southwest of Pottsville. Anthracite coal mining sustained the people who numbered 2,762 in 1900 and 2,943 in 1910. The population was 1,937 at the 2000 census. Lykens is part of the Harrisburg–Carlisle Metropolitan Statistical Area.