Guilbeau v. Falcon Seaboard Drilling Company

• Decision Date: 17 April 1963
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 10313.
• Citation: 215 F. Supp. 909
• Parties: Earl J. GUILBEAU, Plaintiff, v. FALCON SEABOARD DRILLING COMPANY and Standard Insurance Company, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Louisiana

215 F. Supp. 909

Earl J. GUILBEAU, Plaintiff, v. FALCON SEABOARD DRILLING COMPANY and Standard Insurance Company, Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 10313.

United States District Court E. D. Louisiana, New Orleans Division.

April 17, 1963.

Stanley L. Perry, Galliano, La., Dodd, Hirsch, Barker & Meunier, Harold J. Lamy, New Orleans, La., for plaintiff.

Christovich & Kearney, A. R. Christovich, Jr., New Orleans, La., for defendants.

AINSWORTH, District Judge.

This is a suit under the Jones Act, 46 U.S.C.A. § 688, tried by the court without a jury, which at the outset requires a determination of the status of plaintiff as to whether he was a seaman on January 21, 1960, when he sustained physical injuries while employed by defendant Falcon as a floorhand on a submersible oil drilling rig in inland waters near the Louisiana coast of the Gulf of Mexico.

The drilling rig known as Rig No. 4 is a non-self-propelled barge which is moved from one drilling location to another by tugs. It is approximately 260 feet long by 52 feet wide, and is fitted with sleeping quarters and a galley. It has three compartments on each side and water is pumped out of these compartments to float it or pumped in to sink it on location. At the time of the accident the drilling rig was located in a dredged, navigable slip 250 feet wide, having been towed there and set in position by tugs after which its compartments were filled with water and the barge sunk into drilling position.

We must decide preliminarily if this craft is a vessel. The term "vessel" is applied to floating structures capable of transporting something over the water. Gilmore and Black on The Law of Admiralty, § 1-11, p. 30. However, it may also mean something more than a means of transportation on water. It can be a special purpose craft, an unconventional vessel not usually employed as a means of transporting by water but designed for occupations offshore and in the shallow coastal waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Offshore Company v. Robison, 5 Cir., 1959, 266 F.2d 769, 780. The submersible drilling rig here is such a special purpose craft and there can be little question that the drilling barge known as Rig No. 4 is a vessel.

But was plaintiff a seaman entitled to sue under the Jones Act? This, like the preceding question, is one to be determined by the court as the trier of fact. We believe that he was. Plaintiff was a floorhand in the drilling crew of Rig No. 4. He worked on one of the three 8-hour shifts which the crews maintained on the barge and was more or less permanently assigned as a regular employee on this rig. Though there were sleeping quarters aboard, he and the other members of the crew lived ashore and brought their lunch. They were transported to the barge over water in a speed hull of defendant Falcon. Occasionally they slept on the rig and used the galley, but this was not a normal occurrence. Plaintiff and other members of the crew did maintenance work, repairs, chipping and painting when the rig was laid up, helped tie the lines of tugs to the rig when the rig was being moved, and tied up pipe and supply barges and ships which serviced the drilling rig. He was otherwise principally engaged as a floorhand assisting in the drilling of a well exploring for oil and gas. His work, therefore, considered in its entirety, contributed to the accomplishment of the mission of the vessel, Rig No. 4, which was to drill a well in inland waters seeking oil and gas.¹ The rig had been floated into a dredged slip where it was drilling a well. It was not engaged in transportation of either passengers or freight. But admiralty jurisdiction is not limited to transportation of goods and passengers in interstate or foreign commerce but depends upon the jurisdiction conferred in United States Constitution Article 3, § 2, extending the judicial power of the United States to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, including canals and other waters even if they be privately owned or claimed. McKie v. Diamond Marine Co., 5 Cir., 1953, 204 F.2d 132.

Robison, supra, does not require that the trier of fact hold that plaintiff is a seaman merely because he was working at the time of his injury on a submersible, floatable drilling barge, but it does permit such a finding when the case justifies it.² We believe that the facts and circumstances here amply support a finding that plaintiff was a seaman entitled to sue under the Jones Act. As was said in Robison, supra (p. 780 of 266 F.2d), "There is nothing in the Jones act to indicate that Congress intended the law to apply only to conventional members of a ship's company. The absence of any legislative restriction has enabled the law to develop naturally along with the development of unconventional vessels, such as the strange-looking specialized watercraft designed for oil operations offshore and in the shallow coastal waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Many of the Jones Act seamen on these vessels share the same marine risks to which all aboard are subject. And in many instances Jones Act seamen are exposed to more hazards than are bluewater sailors. They run the risk of top-heavy drilling barges collapsing. They run all the risks incident to oil drilling."³

It...