Hastings v. Mann, 9524.
| Decision Date | 11 January 1965 |
| Docket Number | No. 9524.,9524. |
| Citation | 340 F.2d 910 |
| Parties | Hylas N. HASTINGS, Appellant, v. Carl D. MANN, t/a Mann's Harbor Marina, Mann's Harbor, North Carolina, Appellee. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
Walter B. Martin, Jr., Norfolk, Va. (Vandeventer, Black, Meredith & Martin, Norfolk, Va., on brief), for appellant.
Gerald F. White, Elizabeth, N. C. (Martin Kellogg, Jr., Manteo, N. C., and Aydlett & White, Elizabeth City, N. C., on brief), for appellee.
Before HAYNSWORTH, BOREMAN and J. SPENCER BELL, Circuit Judges.
Certiorari Denied April 5, 1965. See 85 S.Ct. 1106.
By a libel in Admiralty Hastings sought to recover damages for injuries he sustained when he slipped and fell upon a ramp designed for the launching of small boats in Pamlico Sound, North Carolina. At the time, he was attempting to launch his own small outboard motor boat, and he was standing in the navigable waters of the Sound when the accident occurred.
We think the District Court properly dismissed the libel as not being within the Admiralty jurisdiction.
The boat launching ramp, owned by Mann, the operator of the small boat marina, was provided for the convenience of his patrons in launching and retrieving their small boats, for which each patron paid a fee of one dollar. The ramp followed the slope of the land from a point some distance above high water to a point well below low water. No portion of it was afloat, for the underwater portion of the launching ramp was securely fastened to the bottom. It was an extension of the land, and there is no jurisdiction in Admiralty to award damages for injuries suffered upon it, unless caused by a vessel.
Traditionally, Admiralty's jurisdiction to grant redress for maritime wrongs was limited to those in which the harmful effect of the wrong was suffered at sea. It was thus held in The Plymouth, 70 U.S. (3 Wall.) 20, 18 L.Ed. 125, that there was no jurisdiction in Admiralty to award damages against a vessel for loss caused by a fire which had spread to a pier and its associated warehouses from the vessel. Since the tort was consummated upon land and the injury suffered there, the tort was regarded as local in nature and not cognizable in Admiralty.
The rule of The Plymouth has been modified, of course, by the Admiralty Jurisdiction Extension Act of 1948.1 That statute gives Admiralty jurisdiction of such torts when caused by a vessel on navigable waters. The traditional distinctions remain, however, to limit Admiralty's jurisdiction when the instrumentality which caused the wrong was not a vessel on navigable waters.
In The Plymouth, the fire-damaged pier was treated as land. Since then, it has been uniformly held that piers, docks, wharves and similar structures extending over navigable waters are extensions of land, though their use and purpose be maritime. Damage to such structures and personal injuries suffered by persons while upon such structures are not compensable in Admiralty, unless, under the 1948 Act, caused by a vessel on navigable waters.2
To come within the land extension rule, of course, the structure must be firmly attached to the land. A vessel moored to a dock does not become an extension of the land nor do other structures secured to the shore by cables, or other temporary means.3
Lighthouses, beacons, buoys and other navigational aids are not encompassed within the land extension doctrine.4 Usually, they are surrounded by water and they have historically been regarded as subjects of Admiralty jurisdiction. They are readily distinguishable from piers and wharves extending over navigable waters and designed and used for the purpose of providing access to vessels afloat for people and land based vehicles and equipment.
The launching ramp with which we deal differs, of course, from a pier or wharf, the seaward portions of which extend over navigable waters but the surfaces of which are not beneath them. That difference is immaterial. Launching ramps, both in their seaward and land portions, are as firmly fixed to the land as is the pier or the wharf. They are designed to permit land based trailers to approach to, or beyond, the water's edge so as to facilitate the launching or the recovery of the boats they are designed to carry. Their purpose and their use are as an extension of land, providing a firm means of closer approach to deep waters for boat-carrying, land based vehicles and for the people who handle them. In the application of the land extension doctrine, there appears no logical basis for distinction between a partially submerged ramp and a pier, the surface of which...
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...v. City of Pascagoula, Miss., 304 F.Supp. 681, 683 (SD Miss.1969); Hastings v. Mann, 226 F.Supp. 962, 964—965 (EDNC 1964), aff'd, 340 F.2d 910 (CA4 1965). A similar view is taken by the English courts. Queen v. Judge of the City of London Court, (1892). 1 Q.B. 273. 7 Hough, Admiralty Jurisd......
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