Crowley Launch & T. Co. v. Wilmington Transp. Co.

• Decision Date: 21 March 1941
• Docket Number: No. 9566.,9566.
• Citation: 117 F.2d 651
• Parties: CROWLEY LAUNCH & TUGBOAT CO. v. WILMINGTON TRANSP. CO.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

117 F.2d 651 (1941)

CROWLEY LAUNCH & TUGBOAT CO. v.WILMINGTON TRANSP. CO.

No. 9566.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

February 14, 1941.

Rehearing Denied March 21, 1941.

Cluff & Bullard, Alfred T. Cluff, and Allan F. Bullard, all of Los Angeles, Cal., for appellant.

Lillick, Geary, McHose & Adams, James L. Adams, and L. Robert Wood, all of Los Angeles, Cal., for appellee.

Before DENMAN, MATHEWS, and HEALY, Circuit Judges.

DENMAN, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal from a final decree in admiralty holding solely at fault the American Tug CrowleyNo. 29, hereafter called Crowley, for damage done to the American Tug Milton S. Patrick, hereafter called Patrick, in a collision between the two tugs on November 10, 1938, in the main channel leading to the inner harbor of Los Angeles Harbor.The only claimed errors of the district court have to do with the navigation of the tugs.The Crowley was unharmed and the amount awarded the owners of the Patrick is not here questioned.

The two tugs were rivals in serving the vessels traversing and mooring in Los Angeles Harbor.The Crowley had sought and obtained the engagement to tow the inbound steamship Canonesa, and met her opposite the Southern Pacific slip when the steamer was proceeding under her own power in a general northerly direction in the main channel.The Canonesa was in the middle of the channel; the Crowley proceeded along the Canonesa's port side.No question is raised as to fault on the Crowley's part with reference to proceeding on her portside of the channel.

The maneuvers leading to the collision occurred between 5:30 and 5:45 in the morning, when the channel was smooth and the visibility good.It was not full daylight but the vessels and their lights were in plain vision of both the tugs throughout their maneuvers.

The Patrick, unaware of the engagement of the Crowley, was waiting in the channel to tender her services to the Canonesa, at a place some 1,600 feet to the northerly of the point where the Crowley began to proceed alongside the steamer.When the Crowley approached the Patrick she was free from the Canonesa, no towing lines having been passed between them.The Crowley took a sheer from the Canonesa's bow wave which turned her towards the Patrick and with which she collided.

The Crowley's contention is that the Patrick was in fault because her position was too near the course of the Canonesa and Crowley, and that this fault was the sole cause of the collision.The district court held that the Patrick's position in the channel was at a proper distance from the Crowley's course, that the Crowley's sheer did not bring her to a contact with the Patrick but that the additional distance the Crowley traversed was caused by the Crowley's captain giving a left rudder and not sufficiently checking her forward motion.This maneuver, though apparently in extremis, the court held was due to the prior and continuing absence of a lookout on the Crowley, whereby her captain had been so occupied in passing a heaving line to the Canonesa on his right that he had not been aware of the Patrick and did not see her until the bow wave of the Canonesa compelled him to look ahead on his course.This although the Crowley had proceeded for 1600 feet northerly up the channel approaching the Patrick at about a six knot speed — that is, the Crowley's captain had not seen the Patrick though she was in plain sight for over two minutes.

The experienced proctors for the Crowley make a perfunctory contention that, although the Crowley was free from and not lashed to the Canonesa, her captain was entitled to rely on the Canonesa's lookout to guide him up the channel.Obviously, the Canonesa's lookout, compelled to watch ahead, could not be looking back down to a free tug under the steamer's portside and abaft her bow, and become responsible for the tug's guidance.Here was gross negligence on the part of the...