Record damages of £275,000 have been awarded in the High Court in Belfast to the widow and family of former football administrator Mervyn Brown who died from asbestosis.
Mr Brown was secretary of the Irish League when he died in 1992 aged 50.
His death came less than a year after it was discovered that he was suffering from a form of asbestosis known as mesothelioma.
His lungs had become infected through exposure to asbestos dust as a child when it was brought home on the clothes of his father who worked in the shipyard.
Mr Brown was also directly exposed to asbestos dust in his early working life when he was an electrician with the former Ulster Transport Authority.
His widow, Anne, who lives in Belfast, and her two daughters, aged 22 and 16, will share the award, the highest ever in an asbestos related case.
The defendants were Harland and Wolff and the NI Transport Holding Company.