Strachan Shipping Company v. Alexander, 19571.
| Decision Date | 27 December 1962 |
| Docket Number | No. 19571.,19571. |
| Citation | 311 F.2d 385 |
| Parties | STRACHAN SHIPPING COMPANY, Appellant, v. Joseph ALEXANDER and Meiji Kaiun, K.K., Appellees. MEIJI KAIUN, K.K., Appellant, v. Joseph ALEXANDER and Strachan Shipping Company, Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Wm. H. McClendon, Jr., Stuart McClendon, New Orleans, La., for appellant.
John P. Nelson, Jr., August J. Bubert, Leonard S. Ungar, New Orleans, La., for Joseph Alexander.
Chaffe, McCall, Phillips, Burke, Toler & Hopkins, Leon Sarpy and James G. Burke, Jr., New Orleans, La., for Meiji Kaiun, K.K.
Before RIVES, CAMERON and BELL, Circuit Judges.
The libelant-appellee Joseph Alexander, a longshoreman, was employed by the third party-respondent, the appellant Strachan Shipping Company, a stevedoring contractor. Alexander and other employees of Strachan were loading cotton in the hold of a ship owned by respondent-appellant, Meiji Kaiun, K.K., when the injury here complained of occurred. The court below, sitting without a jury, entered judgment in favor of the longshoreman against the shipowner upon a finding of unseaworthiness; and then entered judgment over in favor of the shipowner against Strachan, the employer of the longshoreman, upon its finding that Strachan had breached its implied warranty or contract of workmanlike service under the Ryan1 doctrine.
The published opinion of the court below2 correctly sets out the issues involved in the case. The facts found by that court and the legal conclusions based thereon are set out in its opinion, which we adopt with the following additional comments.
In substance, the court found that the longshoreman was injured when he fell backward into a large hole between stowed bales of cotton and that his injuries were not contributed to by any negligence on his part. It found that the hole should have been covered by dunnage, and the failure so to cover the hole caused an unseaworthy condition. It found further that this unseaworthiness was created by the employees of the stevedoring contractor Strachan in that there was an inadequate use of available dunnage in stowing the cotton.
At the trial below the shipowner and the stevedoring contractor strongly resisted the allegations of unseaworthiness made by the injured employee and their arguments before us consist chiefly of their joint effort to sustain that position. But we are satisfied that the record contains abundant evidence to sustain the findings of the trial court on this point against the charge that they are clearly erroneous. And we think the same is true of the less vigorously pressed argument between shipowner and contractor as to which of them was responsible for the failure to cover the hole with dunnage. There was some evidence that a lack of a sufficient supply of dunnage was called to the attention of the ship's mate and that he refused to allow more dunnage to be...
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...Steamship Co., 224 F.2d 746 (3d Cir. 1955); Boleski v. American Export Lines, Inc., 385 F.2d 69 (4th Cir. 1967); Strachan Shipping Co. v. Alexander, 311 F.2d 385 (5th Cir. 1962). This duty, absolute and nondelegable, creates a "species of liability without fault * * *. Derived from and shap......
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Venable v. A/S Det Forenede Dampskibsselskab
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