Atlantic Mut. Ins. Co. v. The Bulkcrude, 93.
| Decision Date | 29 February 1952 |
| Docket Number | No. 93.,93. |
| Citation | 107 F. Supp. 771,1952 AMC 1400 |
| Parties | ATLANTIC MUT. INS. CO. et al. v. THE BULKCRUDE et al. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of Texas |
Royston & Rayzor, Robert Eikel, Houston, Tex., for libellants.
Fulbright, Crooker, Freeman & Bates, Carl G. Stearns, Houston, Tex., for respondents.
Libellants, hull underwriters of the Tug, R. J. Wales, instituted this proceeding to recover losses paid to the tug owners for damages to the Wales, allegedly caused by the negligence of the pilot of the tanker, Bulkcrude. The evidence was confined on the hearing to the question of fault, the amount of damages to be determined hereafter is necessary. The Wales, on a hawser ahead of the Bulkcrude, was tripped and sunk in breaking a sheer of the tanker. The Captain of the Wales was drowned and the parties made a settlement with his estate, without prejudice.
The tugs, R. J. Wales and Roy Hoober, were assigned to assist the Bulkcrude in departing from docks in the western end of the Corpus Christi Turning Basin, under a written contract appended to a tariff schedule of charges for services published by Bay-Houston Towing Co. It provided in part as follows:
"The rates quoted herein and the towage undertaken hereunder are founded on the consideration that Bay-Houston Towing Co., or its tugs * * will not be liable for damages caused by the tow to other property, whether resulting in whole or in part from the negligence of the towing company or its tugs or the charterers of its tugs; the masters and crews of the tugs shall be considered servants of and identified with the vessel or craft towed."
The Bulkcrude is a large, 120,000 barrel tanker with a draft of 31 feet. It was loaded and docked in the Avery Point Turning Basin, which constitutes the northwestern end of the Corpus Christi Turning Basin. The ship channel has a generally uniform depth of 34 feet but narrows to approximately 100 feet at this depth in a slightly southwesterly direction from Avery Point for about a mile where it widens directly east into the Main Turning Basin and passes under the Bascule Bridge into the Port Aransas Waterway. (See Libellant's Ex. 8.)
The Nueces County Navigation Commission has issued instructions requiring all vessels over 200 feet in length in the Port of Corpus Christi to be aided by a tug in passing through the Bascule Bridge. The bridge is only 84 feet wide and there is not room for a vessel the size of the Bulkcrude and a tug to pass, except the tug be on a hawser ahead. Actually this is of very little, if any, assistance to the vessel in making the passage.
The most efficient method of assisting the vessel down the channel to the Main Turning Basin is to have one tug on each bow. Upon reaching the Main Turning Basin there is ample room and time for one of the tugs to go forward on a hawser and then proceed ahead through the bridge, the other dropping off.
On the night of January 10, 1949, the Bulkcrude sailed from the Avery Point Basin with the Wales on a single hawser about 125 feet in length and the Hoober made fast on the starboard bow. This arrangement was consented to, if not directed' by Captain Montgomery, the pilot on the Bulkcrude, in charge of the operations.
The night was clear and the vessel proceeded down the channel on its own power at about three miles per hour nearly to the point where it would have to swing out into the Main Turning Basin and line up for the bridge. At this point it took a sheer to the starboard which, unchecked, would have caused it to strike the General American docks.
In an effort to break the sheer, the pilot, standing on the Bulkcrude's starboard bridge, ordered the vessel hard to port and full ahead. At the same time he signalled the Wales to pull to port and full ahead; and the Hoober full ahead. The Wales obeyed the pilot's orders and an instant later was almost abeam of the Bulkcrude and listing, with the hawser taut over the tug's stern on the starboard.
The pilot, meantime, had been watching to starboard of the Bulkcrude, to see whether it was going to clear the General American docks. He paid no attention to the Wales until a mate, on the starboard bridge with him, said "the tug is turning over". The pilot then looked and the tug was going under. If his attention had been called to it earlier, the pilot could have blown a stop order and averted the sinking.
When the pilot saw what had happened, he ordered the Hoober to pick up the tug's crew in the water. All save the Captain of the Wales were rescued.
The hawser was made fast to the Wales through a pelican hook which releases easily and automatically when a small metal bolt or pin is struck a heavy blow; or, with the hawser taut as it was, a single blow with an axe...
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