The following is not meant to be legal advice.
An action in negligence requires a showing that the defendant owes the plaintiff a duty, that the defendant breached the duty, and the breach is a proximate cause of the injuries the plaintiff suffers. For instance, a company defendant may have a duty to hire engineers to safely operate trains in order to prevent any spillage. A company may breach its duty if it hires an obese engineer who has a history of heart attacks and then derails the train.
Proximate cause deals with foreseeability of injuries to the plaintiff. For example, it may be unlikely that someone would suffer long lasting anxiety and depression from a chemical spill. However, one never knows the lasting of depression when some people even suffer over a year of bitterness from a breakup with someone he/she met only six times.
In strict liability, a defendant is liable for injury to plaintiff whether it exercises due care or not. This distinction arises if a defendant engages in an abnormally dangerous activity. Courts require a defendant to pay regardless of care.
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