Complaint of Bankers Trust Co.

• Citation: 651 F.2d 160
• Decision Date: 24 July 1981
• Docket Number: Nos. 80-1405,80-1450 and 80-1494,No. 80-,No. 80-1405,No. 80-1494,No. 80-1497,No. 80-1496,80-1405,80-,80-1496,80-1494,80-1497,s. 80-1405
• Parties: In the Matter of The Complaint of BANKERS TRUST COMPANY, As Owner-Trustee and Monsanto Company As Chartered Owner, and Keystone Shipping Co., As Chartered Owner and Operator of the S.S. EDGAR M. QUEENY, for Exoneration From and Limitation of Liability. and VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVIERA, S.A., Amoco Overseas Oil Company and Amoco Transport Company, Third-Party Plaintiffs, v. BETHLEHEM STEEL CORPORATION, General Electric Company and The William Powell Company, Third-Party Defendants. Appeal of BANKERS TRUST COMPANY, Monsanto Company and Keystone Shipping Co., atAppeal of B. P. OIL INC. and SOHIO Petroleum Company, Claimants, at1450. Appeal of VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVIERA, S.A., atIn the Matter of Complaint of VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVERIA, S.A., Owner of the TANK VESSEL CORINTHOS, for Exoneration From and Limitation of Liability, Royal Globe Insurance Company, Intervenor Plaintiff. NATIONAL GRANGE MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY and Insurance Company of North America v. BETHLEHEM STEEL CORPORATION, General Electric Company, The William Powell Company, British Petroleum, Ltd., B. P. Oil Inc. and SOHIO Petroleum Company, Third-Party Defendants. Appeal of BANKERS TRUST COMPANY, Monsanto Company and Keystone Shipping Co., atAppeal of B. P. OIL INC. and SOHIO Petroleum Company, Claimants, at1495. Appeal of VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVIERA, S.A., atto 80-1497.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (3rd Circuit)

Page 160

651 F.2d 160

In the Matter of The Complaint of BANKERS TRUST COMPANY, As

Owner-Trustee and Monsanto Company As Chartered Owner, and

Keystone Shipping Co., As Chartered Owner and Operator of

the S.S. EDGAR M. QUEENY, for Exoneration From and

Limitation of Liability.

and

VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVIERA, S.A., Amoco Overseas Oil

Company and Amoco Transport Company, Third-Party Plaintiffs, v. BETHLEHEM STEEL CORPORATION, General Electric Company and The William Powell Company, Third-Party Defendants.

Appeal of BANKERS TRUST COMPANY, Monsanto Company and

Keystone Shipping Co., at No. 80-1405.

Appeal of B. P. OIL INC. and SOHIO Petroleum Company,

Claimants, at No. 80- 1450.

Appeal of VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVIERA, S.A., at No. 80-1496.

In the Matter of Complaint of VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVERIA,

S.A., Owner of the TANK VESSEL CORINTHOS, for Exoneration

From and Limitation of Liability, Royal Globe Insurance

Company, Intervenor Plaintiff.

NATIONAL GRANGE MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY and Insurance

Company of North America v. BETHLEHEM STEEL CORPORATION, General Electric Company, The

William Powell Company, British Petroleum, Ltd.,

B. P. Oil Inc. and SOHIO Petroleum

Company, Third-Party Defendants.

Appeal of BANKERS TRUST COMPANY, Monsanto Company and

Keystone Shipping Co., at No. 80-1494.

Appeal of B. P. OIL INC. and SOHIO Petroleum Company,

Claimants, at No. 80- 1495.

Appeal of VILLANEUVA COMPANIA NAVIERA, S.A., at No. 80-1497.

Nos. 80-1405, 80-1450 and 80-1494 to 80-1497.

United States Court of Appeals Third Circuit.

Argued Jan. 13, 1981.

Decided May 15, 1981.

Rehearings and Rehearings En Banc Denied July 8, 1981.

As Amended July 24, 1981.

James F. Young, and Thomas Fisher, III, Krusen, Evans & Byrne, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellants in Nos. 80-1405 and 80-1494 and as cross-appellees in No. 80-1450 and 80-149 5/7.

Richard W. Palmer, Palmer, Biezup & Henderson, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellee in No. 80-1405, 80-1450, 80-1494, 80-1495 and cross-appellant in No. 80-149 6/7.

Edward V. Cattell, Jr., Clark, Ladner, Fortenbaugh & Young, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellees in No. 80-1405, 80-1494, 80-149 6/7 and as cross-appellants in No. 80-1450 and 80-1495.

Before WEIS and HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judges, and DEBEVOISE, District Judge ^*.

OPINION OF THE COURT

A. LEON HIGGINBOTHAM, Jr., Circuit Judge.

This action is the result of a collision that occurred early on the morning of January 31, 1975 on the Delaware River in Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania. The collision took place when the chemical carrier S.S. EDGAR M. QUEENY (QUEENY), an American steamship, struck the crude oil tanker S.T. CORINTHOS (CORINTHOS), a Liberian steam tanker (owned and operated by Villaneuva Compania Naviera S.A. (Villaneuva), as the CORINTHOS discharged a cargo of crude oil at the B.P. Oil Inc./Sohio Petroleum Company Terminal (BP/Sohio). ¹ It resulted in the loss of 26 lives as well as other personal injuries, extensive damage to the terminal, the destruction of the CORINTHOS, oil pollution in the Delaware River, minor damage to the QUEENY, and damage to neighboring properties. The owners and operators of each vessel subsequently brought suit in admiralty, claiming that the other vessel was exclusively at fault and that they should be exonerated from liability or, in the alternative, that their liability should be limited.

The issues on appeal concern whether the district court erred with respect to the following: first, its denial of the petitions for limitation of liability filed by the owners and operators of the QUEENY (Bankers Trust Company (Bankers Trust) Monsanto Company (Monsanto) and Keystone Shipping Co. (Keystone Shipping ) (collectively the QUEENY INTERESTS or Keystone)); and, secondly, its ruling that under the preemption doctrine, federal legislation precluded it from holding the owners and operators of either the CORINTHOS or BP/Sohio liable. We will reverse each of those holdings, 503 F.Supp. 337. We find that Keystone's management was not privy to the cause of the accident and that the district court was not preempted from considering the liability of the CORINTHOS and BP/Sohio. Moreover, we rule that the alternative finding of the trial court that the CORINTHOS was unseaworthy was in error. ²

I.

The parties have saturated us with thousands of pages of transcript, hundreds of exhibits, a plethora of expert testimony and extensive briefs. This inundation of evidence may have been necessary for the trial court to make proper findings, but a landlubber's analogy might be more appropriate to put this case in context.

Every novice automobile driver knows that, by the laws of physics, when one seeks to make a U-turn in a small area where the space is less than the circumference required for the full turning arc of the car, the turn can be successfully maneuvered only with a series of forward and backward motions. On a river, where the area is not wide enough for a turn in one maneuver, a 180 degree turning process is an even more complex maneuver. The "roadbed" of the ship moves with the momentum of the tide. Ships have no brakes which can keep an unanchored vessel at a permanent standstill so as to avoid drifting and possible collisions. Thus, even an experienced captain of a ship must rely on professional pilots whose function on the ship is to aid the captain in making intricate turns, maneuvers and docking. In nautical terminology, we say that the pilot conns ³ the vessel. Tugs are also often used to assist him in this process.

The instant case arises because in the process of making a 180 degree turn on the Delaware River, the purportedly experienced pilot of the QUEENY who conned the vessel made tragic errors of judgment. He failed to back and fill ⁴ enough and to use efficiently the tug that was assisting him in the turn.

Clearly the collision was attributable primarily to the pilot's and the captain's negligence in executing the 180o turn. On this appeal, the parties have not questioned the trial court's finding that the collision was also caused in part by the failure of the owners to correct a purportedly defective astern guardian valve a vital component of the ship's engine mechanism. The question we must consider is whether the owners have privity or knowledge of this deficiency in the valve.

II. FACTS

The QUEENY is a single screw, steam powered tank vessel of 19,046 gross tons. It is 660.2 feet in length, 90 feet in breadth, and powered by a 15,000 horsepower steam turbine. It was designed and built during the late 1960's as a multiproduct chemical tanker by the Bethlehem Steel Corporation (Bethlehem) for Monsanto and it was delivered to Keystone as an operator in September of 1970. Pursuant to a subcontract with Bethlehem, its turbine set and controls were supplied by the General Electric Company (GE). GE subcontracted with the William Powell Company (Powell) for the manufacture of a marine astern guardian valve a valve to be used in the turbine. As will be noted later, the functioning of this valve is of great importance in this litigation.

The CORINTHOS was a single screw, steam powered tank vessel of 30,705 gross tons. It was 723.7 feet in length, 106 feet in breadth and powered by a 17,000 horsepower steam turbine. On January 30, 1975, the CORINTHOS was moored at the BP/Sohio refinery dock on the Delaware River where it was discharging a cargo of crude oil. Across the river, the QUEENY was moored in Bridgeport, New Jersey in order to discharge part of its cargo.

On January 31, 1975, the QUEENY left port headed for the next discharge facility in Paulsboro, New Jersey. She was under the command of Captain Fay Kellog. Pilot Sverre Sorenson was at the conn of the ship. Both Captain Kellog and Pilot Sorenson had performed docking and undocking maneuvers on many occasions aboard the QUEENY. To proceed upstream to the next facility, they knew she had to make a 180o starboard turn. Visability was clear from eight to ten miles. The eastern half of the Marcus Hook channel was closed for dredging operations reducing the channel width from its standard 800 feet to 400 feet and, therefore, making turning in the river considerably more difficult.

The captain and pilot were on the bridge at the time of the undocking maneuver. To undock, the QUEENY used its main engine and bow thruster, and its rudder was hard left. The Tug Tanda 12, which had been engaged to help with the undocking, was located on the port bow. Pilot Sorenson was at the conn and in radio communication with the tug.

When the vessel had cleared the dock, the QUEENY began backing and filling. To do this, it used a series of astern and ahead maneuvers in conjunction with the vessel's rudder, the bow thruster, and the tugboat. This facilitated the starboard turn of the vessel and positioned her to go upstream. Both the captain and pilot knew the eastern half of the channel was closed.

To assist in the turning maneuver, at the early stages, the Tug Tanda 12 pushed at the QUEENY's port bow. Before the attempt to turn was completed, the QUEENY backed and filled at least twice to prepare for it. Tug Tanda 12 was then released from the port bow and instructed to stand by in Paulsboro, New Jersey. Captain Kellog was on the starboard wing of the bridge and Pilot Sorenson was on the port wing.

When the tug was released the vessel's capacity to turn dramatically decreased, but Captain Kellog was not alarmed. He expected Pilot Sorenson to make additional back and fill maneuvers as he had done on many other occasions in similar situations. The QUEENY's forward acceleration, however, actually increased and, consequently, the captain grew apprehensive, feeling that the QUEENY might not clear the CORINTHOS due to the pilot's failure to continue to back and fill. He voiced his concern about the "closeness" of the situation, but the pilot replied, "Captain, she should make that o.k." Later, Captain Kellog again voiced his concern stating that they should go astern...