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.
"Tamassee" is an unincorporated community located in northwestern Oconee County, South Carolina, United States. The Tamassee area is located in and very near the Blue Ridge Mountains. A large part of the community occupies the scenic Cheohee Valley, “a beautiful rolling meadow framed by mountains and a wide triangle of sky. ” The valley, in fact, is surrounded by a portion of the southern Blue Ridge Mountains called the “Chattooga Escarpment” in reference to a Federally Designated Wild and Scenic River, the Chattooga, which flows just beyond these mountain ridges. Tamassee is bordered on the West and North by the Pickens Ranger District of the Sumter National Forest. This area of national forest is characterized by a portion of the Blue Ridge Escarpment, rivers, waterfalls and hiking trails. The area is noted for it’s extremely rich biological diversity; which is said to owe to unique soil characteristics and elevated annual precipitation levels.