Rig Owner and Charterer Owe No Duty to Casing Hand on Rig for Allegedly Unsafe Equipment

Rig Owner and Charterer Owe No Duty to Casing Hand on Rig for Allegedly Unsafe Equipment

By: Kristen Legendre

 Hewitt v. Noble Drilling, US, LLC, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 63497 (E.D. La. 2016); 2016 U.S. Dist. WL 2866512 (E.D. La. 2016).Defendant Frank’s International (“Franks”) employed plaintiff Walter Hewitt as a casing crew member when he sustained injuries aboard the FRONTIER DRILLER, owned by defendant Noble Drilling (“Noble”) and operated by defendant Shell Offshore (“Shell”). The plaintiff alleges that following a gust of wind, a toolbox lid smashed onto his head and that the toolbox lid was unsafe because it lacked safety measures to prevent the lid from quickly closing. Plaintiff brought claims under the Jones Act and general maritime law for unseaworthiness, maintenance and cure, punitive damages for failure to pay maintenance and cure, and also brought a claim under the Longshore and Harbor Worker’s Compensation Act (“LHWCA”). The court previously dismissed the Jones Act and other seaman related claims on Summary Judgment. Defendants filed motions for summary judgment seeking to dismiss plaintiff’s remaining LHWCA claim.Plaintiff brings a claim under the LHWCA against Noble as owner and Shell as operator. Defendants argue that they cannot be held liable under the LHWCA because they neither owned nor controlled the tool box that caused the injury; furthermore, that they had no duty to inspect or supervise the work done by Franks, who constructed, owned, and utilized the toolbox in its casing work. The plaintiff argues that the toolbox was incorporated into the vessel, in turn becoming a defective appurtenance, which caused the vessel to be unsafe, and that Noble and Shell should therefore be held liable for the hazardous condition.Arguing that they did not breach a duty to the plaintiff, Noble and Shell rely on Scindia Stream Nav. Co. v. De Los Santos, which describes the three duties of a vessel owner: “(1) the duty to turn over a reasonably safe vessel, (2) the duty to protect against hazards if the vessel is left in the owner’s active control, and (3) the duty to intervene to prevent use of an unsafe practice if the vessel owner is aware that it is being undertaken.” Plaintiff argues that the case does not apply because the plaintiff in that case was not engaged in the normal stevedoring operations of loading and unloading; however, plaintiff failed to provide any support for his contention. The Fifth Circuit held that the duties outlined in Scindia extend beyond stevedore work, so the district court applied the duties set forth in Scindia to this case.Turnover Duty: According to Scindia, the vessel owner has a duty to exercise ordinary care to have the ship and equipment in condition such that an expert or experienced contractor is able to carry on its operations safely. Movants argue that because they did not own the equipment that caused the injury, they did not breach this duty. Plaintiff does not dispute that Franks was the owner of the toolbox. Furthermore, the turnover duty includes the duty of the vessel owner to alert the contactor of hazards with respect to the ship or equipment that he knows or should know. The defendants argue that even the Franks crew was unaware of the hazard until after the accident, therefore they did not breach the duty. The plaintiff didn’t dispute the point, and the court found that the movants did not breach the duty.Active Control Duty: Second, Scindia holds that a vessel owner can be held liable if actively involved in the contractor’s operations and is negligent in injuring a longshoreman. The plaintiff first alleged that the movants owned and controlled his workstation, but his deposition testimony was contradictory when he testified that Franks controlled the workspace. Furthermore, he failed to offer evidence that Franks was not in fact in control of the casing operations at the time of the accident; therefore, movants did not breach the active control duty.Duty to Intervene: Lastly, Scindia sets out the requirement that if the vessel owner has actual knowledge of a danger that the contractor cannot or will not correct such danger, it has a duty to intervene in those operations. Despite the uncontested fact that neither Franks nor the defendants knew of the tool box’s hazard, Plaintiff still argues that it creates a “defective appurtenance of the vessel,” rendering it unsafe. The Fifth Circuit has held that mere presence of danger does not create a duty to intervene. Accordingly, the movants did not breach the duty to intervene.Because movants did not breach any of the duties outlined in Scindia, they cannot be held liable for negligence under the LHWCA, their motions for summary judgment were granted, and the plaintiff’s claims against them were dismissed with prejudice.