Olsen v. Isbrandtsen Company

• Decision Date: 20 September 1962
• Citation: 209 F. Supp. 6
• Parties: Ray OLSEN, Plaintiff, v. ISBRANDTSEN COMPANY, Inc., Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

209 F. Supp. 6

Ray OLSEN, Plaintiff, v. ISBRANDTSEN COMPANY, Inc., Defendant.

United States District Court S. D. New York.

September 20, 1962.

Kenneth Heller, New York City, for plaintiff.

Dougherty, Ryan, Mahoney & Pellegrino, New York City, for defendant; Thomas J. Short, New York City, of counsel.

EDWARD WEINFELD, District Judge.

Plaintiff, formerly chief mate aboard the s/s Columbia Heights, owned and operated by the defendant, seeks to recover damages arising out of injuries sustained by him while the vessel was docked at a pier at Ocho Rios, Jamaica, British West Indies.

Plaintiff was injured as he stepped off the ship's gangway ladder when the vessel suddenly surged aft and his right foot was caught by the roller at the dock end of the gangway. In order to prevent crushing of his leg as the vessel continued to surge, the plaintiff threw himself to the dock with his left foot in the air but the roller moved back and forth over his right foot until the gangway was lifted by crew members. He charges the defendant with negligence and unseaworthiness of the vessel, the essence of which revolves about the failure to keep the vessel safely moored and the lack of reasonably adequate equipment and personnel to carry out that function.

Ocho Rios Bay is an open roadstead with swells coming in from the open sea. Because of the continuous swells, vessels berth eight to ten feet from the pier in order to prevent their pounding against the dock. Two buoys, anchored in water, are located about 450 feet off the dock and vessels are moored with lines to the buoys as well as to the pier.

The s/s Columbia Heights arrived at Ocho Rios on Sunday, December 23, 1956 at about 7 A.M. and was docked starboard side eight to ten feet off the pier. She was secured to the pier and the offshore mooring buoys with ten mooring lines, five forward and five aft, of fabricated manilla seven or eight inches in diameter. Eight of these lines ran inshore to the dock and were secured as follows: two from the port and starboard gypsy heads located forward to the dock and one line from the aft capstan to the dock; the balance to fixed bitts. Two lines ran offshore, one from the forward, and the other from the aft, part of the vessel to the offshore mooring buoys on the port side; these lines were practically abreast of the bow and of the stern at approximately ninety-degree angles. When the vessel was secured, the mooring buoys were about 350-400 feet abeam of the ship which was sixty-two feet in width.

The gangway was rigged at a forty-five degree angle leading aft. It was of steel construction and weighed approximately 2000 pounds. It had a swivel at the deck end and a metal roller at the dock end; the roller was twenty-two inches wide and six inches in diameter and protruded at the forward edge of the dock end. As the vessel surged the gangway moved first on the swivel and then rolled upon the roller. An intended purpose of the roller was to prevent damage to the dock when the vessel surged.

Prior to the commencement of loading, the vessel was secured in a seaworthy fashion; the mooring lines were hoved up tight and there was no appreciable motion of the ship. At about 8 A.M. the vessel commenced to receive cargo by means of a shoreside movable chute and conveyor at the rate of 1000 tons an hour, which increased the vessel's draft twenty-two inches an hour. From the start of loading operations to 10:40 A.M., when plaintiff was injured, the draft of the vessel increased in excess of fifty inches and as a result the inshore mooring lines became increasingly slack but were not taken in or made taut.

At all times during the loading there were heavy swells causing the vessel to surge with each swell at times as much as six and eight feet fore and aft. The vessel was in continuous motion, rising and falling and surging in toward the dock.

Shortly before plaintiff met with his accident, the ship surged up and down six to eight feet. The plaintiff, at about 10:40 A.M., walked down the gangway in order to make preparations to move the vessel forward; as he came to the end of the gangway and stepped down with his right foot onto the dock, a fast, strong swell caused the ship to surge aft, causing the gangway roller to roll over his right foot as already described. Clearly the huge surge was the result of failure to make the mooring lines taut as they became increasingly slack during the loading operations.

The defendant was under an absolute duty to plaintiff to furnish a seaworthy vessel — a ship and appliances that were reasonably fit for their intended use.¹ It was also under a duty to exercise reasonable care to afford plaintiff a reasonably safe place to work, which duty extended to the means of ingress and egress to and from the vessel.² While these separate duties rest upon different legal concepts,³ in end result they require the shipowner to furnish a reasonably safe ship and place in which to work, the practical difference being that in the instance of an unseaworthiness claim notice to the owner of the condition is immaterial, whereas in a negligence claim it is an essential element of liability.⁴

We consider first the claim of unseaworthiness. While the duty of the owner to furnish a seaworthy vessel is absolute, whether or not a vessel is in fact seaworthy involves a relative concept dependent in each particular case upon time, place and other factors.⁵ What may be seaworthiness under one set of circumstances may be unseaworthiness under different circumstances. The basic inquiry is whether, under all the circumstances, the vessel was reasonably fit for plaintiff to carry out his job with reasonable safety.

The Court is persuaded that the gangway which moved with each surge of the vessel was not, under the prevailing conditions, reasonably fit for its intended use. The roller which yielded with each surge because of the excessively slack lines rendered the gangway dangerous at the time the plaintiff was injured and constituted an unseaworthy condition. Had the lines been made taut, there would have been relatively little movement of the ship. It is true that surging of a vessel is to be expected with swells and normally a vessel would not be rendered unseaworthy solely by reason thereof; but here the vessel was surging as much as six to eight feet with each swell for some time before the accident and only because of the failure to make the lines taut as loading progressed and the draft increased. Proper lines would have reduced the surge considerably and thus the likelihood of injury to those using the gangway.

Since the hazardous condition of the gangway was the result of failure to maintain taut lines, it is unimportant whether this failure, as the plaintiff urges, was due to lack of snatch blocks on board the vessel capable of use in conjunction with the mooring lines or to lack of adequate crew in number. The fact is that the lines were permitted to become and remain excessively slack; it was this in combination with the roller which proximately resulted in rendering the gangway not reasonably fit for its intended use. The condition existed long enough prior to the accident to charge the master with notice sufficient also to sustain the claim of negligence.

The defendant seeks to avert liability, contending that the plaintiff, by reason of failure properly to discharge his duties as chief mate, was responsible for the unsafe condition. Even if this were so, it would not exonerate the defendant entirely, but only serve in mitigation of damages.⁶ The Court is satisfied that the plaintiff must share part of the responsibility for the occurrence. He was the officer in charge of the loading and was as familiar with conditions as the master. He was required during loading operations to see to it that the vessel...