Opinion ID: 411725
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: alternate causes of action

Text: 42 Fox next claims that the district court erred in denying his claim based on the unseaworthiness of the SPAR. The owner of a vessel owes a warranty of seaworthiness to longshoremen working on the vessel. Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U.S. 85, 66 S.Ct. 872, 90 L.Ed. 1099 (1946). This basis for recovery was severely limited by the 1972 Amendments to the LHWCA. See Edmonds v. Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 443 U.S. 256, 262-63, 99 S.Ct. 2753, 2757, 61 L.Ed.2d 521 (1979). Yet even if the right still exists for a limited class of Sieracki seamen, see Aparicio v. Swan Lake, 643 F.2d 1109, 1118 n. 17 (5th Cir.1981), it does not exist for Fox. 43 While Fox was not working on a vessel or fleet of vessels, a warranty of seaworthiness can also extend to an appurtenance to a vessel. See Brown & Root, Inc. v. DeSautell, 554 S.W.2d 764 (Tex.Civ.App.--Houston [1st Dist.] 1977, writ ref'd n.r.e.). It is this seaworthiness claim that Fox asks this Court to consider. 44 We begin by recognizing that the SPAR is a piece of equipment that can be vital to the repair operations Taylor Diving was planning. It would be impossible to say, under such circumstances, that a SPAR could never be an appurtenance to a vessel. The barge that traveled with SPAR-6 could be considered a vessel. Davis v. Hill Engineering, Inc., 549 F.2d 314 (5th Cir.1977). We find, however, that the SPAR was not functioning as an appurtenance to a vessel. An appurtenance to a vessel must be in use in conjunction with the primary functioning of the vessel at the time of the accident, in order for a warranty of seaworthiness to attach to that object. At the time of Fox's injury, the SPAR was in dry dock for repairs and could not have been part of a vessel's operations, whether of the BAR 331 or any other. Our finding is in accord with Miller v. A/B Svenska Amerika Linien, 454 F.2d 1094 (3d Cir.1971), where a longshoreman slipped on a puddle from a leaky bucket. The bucket had been used on a deck to hold drinking water for longshoremen, but later was laid down at dockside, where the accident occurred. The court stated that although the bucket may have been an appurtenance while on the vessel, it lost this character once it was removed. We find similarly that a SPAR cannot be an appurtenance while in dry dock and non-operational. Therefore no warranty of seaworthiness could extend to cover Fox's cause of action.