Opinion ID: 2960624
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: ABS’s Handling of SafeHull Information

Text: 22 Spain also contends that ABS acted recklessly in its handling of information from the SafeHull modeling runs that were performed. Spain’s (implicit) argument on this point seems straightforward: Marine Services, an ABS subsidiary, did SafeHull modeling runs on two tankers (the Alexandros and Centaur) built at the same time to the same plans as the Prestige, which indicated that certain aspects of the structure of those vessels were especially prone to fatigue and corrosion; yet ABS neither caused Marine Services to use SafeHull to assess the Prestige itself, nor notified ABS surveyors of the results of the SafeHull assessments of the Alexandros and Centaur. This failure, according to Spain, deprived ABS surveyors of information necessary to conduct a thorough and proper evaluation of the Prestige in 2001 and 2002, leading to the vessel’s casualty in November 2002. This simple argument founders on a simple problem—Spain has not introduced evidence from which a reasonable jury could conclude that the Alexandros and the Centaur were in fact sufficiently similar to the Prestige that ABS had a tort duty to extrapolate from the results of Marine Services’ SafeHull analyses in assessing the latter vessel.12 In the district court, Spain introduced, and relied upon, excerpts from the deposition taken by Spain of Gus Bourneuf, 12 ABS does not dispute Spain’s assertion, see J.A. 737, that senior ABS personnel reviewed and assessed the reports generated by Marine Services’ SafeHull analyses of the Alexandros and the Centaur. 23 who at the relevant times was Chief Surveyor at ABS. J.A. 737, 841-845. In the excerpt used by Spain, Bourneuf testified that ABS had concluded in the mid-1990s that, even with regard to ships with the same design and built to the same drawings, “what is found on one ship [with regard to structural fatigue] may not, in fact, be found on a sister ship,” because fatigue analyses are affected by “where the ship operates, the type of cargo she is carrying, the type of trade she was in, the temperature of the water, and many other variables.” J.A. 844. ABS therefore determined that SafeHull analyses would be regarded as shipspecific, rather than extrapolable to sister ships. J.A. 843-844. Spain has not disputed that these variables affect the structural fatigue actually experienced by a given vessel. Here, Spain has not introduced evidence that the Prestige had a service history comparable along the variables listed by Bourneuf to that of the Alexandros or Centaur. Nor could a reasonable jury conclude, on this evidentiary record, that, notwithstanding potential differences in service history, the SafeHull results as to the Alexandros and the Centaur were sufficiently probative as to the Prestige that ABS was reckless in declining, or failing, to include those results in the information regarding the Prestige that ABS supplied to its surveyors or to the owners of the vessel. 24