For more than two decades, Donald R. Terwilliger worked as a coke oven lid man at Bethlehem Steel in Lackawanna.

The job required him to work on top of the plant's massive coke oven batteries, not far from where the ovens released their emissions.

Years later, Terwilliger would die of lung cancer.

Earlier this month, New York's highest court granted Terwilliger's son and others the right to sue the manufacturers of those ovens.

"It's like working on a giant cigarette," said John N. Lipsitz, the attorney representing Donald J. Terwilliger. "I don't know how many hundreds, maybe thousands, of workers labored over those coke ovens."

In siding with Terwilliger, the State Court of Appeals overturned a lower court ruling tossing out his lawsuit. It also opened the door to more suits accusing Honeywell and others manufacturers of causing worker deaths.

From the start, Terwilliger argued that coke ovens are a product covered by products liability and that Honeywell, and its predecessor Allied Chemical, had a responsibility to alert users of their harmful nature.

"The allegation is that the company knew about the risks and should have warned workers," Lipsitz said.