Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 188

529US1

Unit: $U35

[09-26-01 09:32:43] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 89 (2000)

113

Opinion of the Court

that its crew has “complete[d] a comprehensive training pro-
gram approved by the [State].” The State requires the ves-
sel’s master to “be trained in shipboard management” and
licensed deck ofﬁcers to be trained in bridge resource man-
agement, automated radar plotting aids, shiphandling, crude
oil washing, inert gas systems, cargo handling, oil spill pre-
vention and response, and shipboard ﬁre ﬁghting. The state
law mandates a series of “weekly,” “monthly,” and “quar-
terly” drills.

This state requirement under WAC § 317–21–230 does not
address matters unique to the waters of Puget Sound. On
the contrary,
it imposes requirements that control the
stafﬁng, operation, and manning of a tanker outside of Wash-
ington’s waters. The training and drill requirements per-
tain to “operation” and “personnel qualiﬁcations” and so are
pre-empted by 46 U. S. C. § 3703(a). Our conclusion that
training is a ﬁeld reserved to the Federal Government re-
ceives further conﬁrmation from the circumstance that the
STCW Convention addresses “training” and “qualiﬁcation”
requirements of the crew, Art. VI, and that the United
States has enacted crew training requirements. E. g., 46
CFR pts. 10, 12, 13, 15 (1999).

The second Washington rule we ﬁnd pre-empted is WAC
§ 317–21–250; see also Appendix, infra, at 119. Washington
imposes English language proﬁciency requirements on a
tanker’s crew. This requirement will dictate how a tanker
operator staffs the vessel even from the outset of the voyage,
when the vessel may be thousands of miles from Puget
Sound.
It is not limited to governing local trafﬁc or local
peculiarities. The State’s attempted rule is a “personnel
qualiﬁcation” pre-empted by § 3703(a) of Title II.
In
there is another federal statute, 33 U. S. C.
addition,
It provides: “[N]o vessel . . .
§ 1228(a)(7), on the subject.
shall operate in the navigable waters of
the United
States . . . , if such vessel . . . while underway, does not have
at least one licensed deck ofﬁcer on the navigation bridge