Exxon Co. v. Sofec, Inc., 94-15806
| Decision Date | 26 April 1995 |
| Docket Number | No. 94-15806,94-15806 |
| Parties | EXXON COMPANY; Exxon Shipping Company, Plaintiffs-Counter-Defendants-Third-Party Defendants-Appellants, v. SOFEC, INC., Defendant-Counter-Claimant-Appellee. PACIFIC RESOURCES, INC.; Hawaiian Independent Refinery, Inc.; PRI Marine, Inc.; PRI International, Inc., Defendants-Cross-Claimants-Third-Party Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. Griffin WOODHOUSE, Griffin Woodhouse, Inc., Third-Party Defendant-Appellee, Bridon Fibres and Plastics, Ltd., Defendant-Third-Party Defendant-Appellee. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
Shirley M. Hufstedler, Hufstedler & Kaus, Los Angeles, CA, for plaintiffs-counter-defendants-third-party defendants-appellants.
George W. Playdon, Jr., Reinwald, O'Connor, Marrack, Hoskins & Playdon, Honolulu, HI, for defendants-cross-claimants-third-party plaintiffs-appellees Pacific Resources, Inc., Hawaiian Independent Refinery, Inc., PRI Marine, Inc., PRI Intern., Inc.
David W. Proudfoot, Belles Graham & Proudfoot, Lihue, HI, for defendant-third-party defendant-appellee Bridon Fibres and Plastics, Ltd.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Hawaii.
Before: CANBY, WIGGINS, and T.G. NELSON, Circuit Judges.
OVERVIEW
Exxon Shipping Co. and Exxon Company U.S.A. (collectively, "Exxon") appeal the district court's judgment following a bench trial in Exxon's admiralty action seeking damages for loss of its tanker, the Exxon Houston, and costs of oil spill cleanup and loss of cargo. Exxon maintains that the failure of a Single Point Mooring System ("SPM") manufactured by defendant Sofec and sold by defendants Pacific Resources, Inc. and associated corporations (collectively, "HIRI" 1) was the actual and proximate cause of its losses. The district court found in Phase One of a bifurcated proceeding that Exxon's negligence superseded any damage caused by the failure of the SPM, and was the sole proximate cause of the Houston 's stranding. On appeal, Exxon argues that the district court improperly bifurcated the proceedings and that the doctrine of superseding cause
has no application to cases in admiralty. We affirm the district court's order.
This case arises from the stranding of the Exxon Houston on March 2, 1989, near the Island of Oahu, several hours after it broke away from an SPM owned and operated by defendants HIRI. The Houston, a steam propulsion oil tanker weighing over 72,000 dead weight tons, was engaged in delivering oil via two floating hoses into HIRI's submerged pipeline, pursuant to a contract between Exxon and defendant Pacific Resources International, Inc. ("PRII"), when a heavy southern storm (locally termed a Kona storm) caused a break in the chafe chain linking the vessel to the SPM. As the vessel drifted, the two oil hoses broke away from the SPM. Because the hoses were bolted to the ship rather than secured by more readily detachable safety locks, a long (800 feet) length of one hose remained attached to the ship, and interfered with her ability to maneuver.
While the parting of the first hose did not cause a significant threat to the Houston, the parting and partial sinking of the second, longer hose, weighed down by a heavy piece of spool torn from the SPM, threatened to foul the ship's propeller. The parting of the second hose at approximately 1728, 2 designated as the "breakout" or "breakaway," is the initiating point in time for events covered in the Phase One trial.
Immediately after the breakout, the Coast Guard contacted the Houston to see whether it needed assistance, but because he was advised assistance vessels would not arrive within two hours, Houston 's Captain Kevin Coyne refused the offer, thinking the problem would be resolved within that time. Captain Coyne did not thereafter request assistance from the Coast Guard. During the two hours and forty-one minutes following the breakout, Captain Coyne took the ship through a series of phases described in some detail in the district court's findings of fact. These phases are summarized in the following paragraphs.
At about 1740, Captain Coyne attempted to anchor, dropping a single anchor which paid out one shot (90 feet) of chain. On the basis of expert testimony, the district court found that Captain Coyne failed to follow standard maritime practice, which would have involved releasing five to six shots of chain to hold the ship under the circumstances. The Houston had twelve shots of chain available for each of its two anchors. After this attempt to anchor failed, Captain Coyne made no further efforts to anchor the Houston before it stranded, although the district court found there were numerous places en route he could safely have done so.
By 1803, the small assist vessel Nene was able, with the assistance of the Houston, to get control of the end of the second hose so that it was no longer a threat to the larger ship. Captain Coyne controlled the Nene 's movements as necessary to coordinate with the Houston's movements. Between 1803 and 1830, Captain Coyne maneuvered the Houston out to sea and away from shallow water.
Between 1830 and 2009, the time of stranding, the district court found that Captain Coyne made a series of ill-advised moves. Perhaps most significant was his failure to plot the ship's position on the chart between 1830 and 2004. Rather than plotting fixes of the vessel's position at regular intervals, Captain Coyne relied after 1830 entirely on parallel indexing, a supplemental technique which, according to Exxon's Navigation and Bridge Organization Manual ("Navigation Manual"), "does not relieve the ship's officer of the duty to frequently plot the position of the ship on the chart by means of navigational fixes." Without a fix, Captain Coyne was unable to make effective use of the chart to check for hazards.
Between 1830 and 1947, the crews of the Houston and the Nene worked to disconnect the second hose from the Houston. This was accomplished by 1947. The Houston 's port crane collapsed in the process, taking the Finally, at 1956, Captain Coyne made a disastrous final turn to the right (toward the shore) which resulted in the ship's stranding. Given that the Kona storm was threatening to push the vessel into shore, it is not clear why the Captain chose to turn right instead of continuing to back out safely to sea, or turning to port, away from the coast. Both options were viable. The district court found Captain Coyne's explanations for his decision unconvincing. Because he had not taken fixes, Captain Coyne apparently was unaware of the ship's position until he ordered Third Mate Spiller to do so at 2004. Third Mate Spiller testified that on seeing the 2004 fix on the chart, Captain Coyne uttered an expletive and immediately ordered an increased speed. Moments later the ship ran aground on a reef near the shore.
crane operator's seat with it onto the deck. The second mate went below to attend to the crane operator, who was in shock, leaving Captain Coyne alone on the bridge at 1948. Although the Navigation Manual requires that at least two officers be present on the bridge at all times, Captain Coyne did not call upon any of the other available officers to join him until 2000. The district court found that if the bridge had been properly manned, the stranding danger would have been avoided.
In April, 1990, Exxon filed its complaint in admiralty against HIRI and Sofec (the manufacturer of the SPM) for the loss of its ship and cargo, and for oil spill cleanup costs. HIRI filed a third-party complaint against Bridon Fibres and Plastics, Ltd. ("Bridon"), and Griffin Woodhouse, Ltd. ("Griffin"). 3 On June 3, 1992, Griffin moved to bifurcate the trial. All defendants joined the motion. The district court granted the motion on July 31, 1992, limiting the first phase of the trial to the issue of causation with respect to the Houston 's grounding, leaving the issue of causation with respect to the breakout for Phase Two.
After conducting a bench trial in admiralty between February 9, 1993, and March 3, 1993, the district court found that Captain Coyne's (and by imputation, Exxon's) extraordinary negligence was the sole proximate and superseding cause of the Houston 's grounding. Exxon filed an appeal on June 16, 1993, which was dismissed for lack of a final judgment. Following motions by Bridon and Exxon, the district court entered a final motion precluding all of Exxon's claims for loss of the vessel on April 20, 1994. We have jurisdiction over Exxon's subsequent timely appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1291, and we affirm the judgment.
The district court's conclusions of law are reviewed de novo. Havens v. F/T Polar Mist, 996 F.2d 215, 217, 1994 A.M.C. 605 (9th Cir.1993). Exxon argues that the Supreme Court's holding in United States v. Reliable Transfer Co., 421 U.S. 397, 95 S.Ct. 1708, 44 L.Ed.2d 251 (1975), replacing the historical divided damages rule in favor of comparative negligence in admiralty cases, vitiates the use of concepts such as intervening force and superseding cause. In Reliable Transfer, the Court rejected the rule whereby damages were divided equally between or among negligent vessels (usually in collision cases) regardless of the degree of fault attributable to each. Id. at 397, 411, 95 S.Ct. at 1709, 1715-16. In concluding, the Court stated that:
[W]hen two or more parties have contributed by their fault to cause property damage in a maritime collision or stranding, liability for such damage is to be allocated among the parties proportionately to the comparative degree of their fault, and that liability for such damages is to be allocated equally only ... when it is not possible fairly to measure the comparative degree of their fault.
Id. at 411, 95 S.Ct. at 1715-16.
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