Court Opinion

ID: 9461402
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:13:53.638153+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:02.911418
License: Public Domain

KOELSCH, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
The trial judge, as the majority recognizes, was well aware of the nice distinction between operational negligence and unseaworthiness. That being true, I share the view of the Second Circuit in Radovich v. Cunard Steamship Co., 364 F.2d 149, 152 (2d Cir. 1966), that
“If anything emerges from these cases other than the difficulty of applying the act-condition (or operational negligence-unseaworthiness) dichotomy, it is that the findings of the trier of fact should be left undisturbed, if the law to be applied to the facts is properly understood.”
*1058It is well to note that the evidence in this record was essentially uncontradicted and that the crucial findings of fact, now rejected by the majority, concern motive and intent — matters of a kind which sometime elude easy perception in cold records, which generally tend to lack flavor.
Given the undisputed fact that “lengths of pipe must be straightened before they can be loaded in the cars,” does it necessarily follow that all operators act alike in aligning their loads. Or is it inconceivable because no operator during the six prior shifts had performed the operation by slamming his load against the gondola car, and that no one had previously observed this done, that Bono’s act was not “conscious and intended,” as the court found. Or can we unhesitatingly say that the fact-finder was nonetheless mistaken when he further found that “The procedure employed would have been, in all likelihood, repeated if not for the injury to Ryan.” I am firmly convinced the answer is “No.”
Because the majority does not reach appellant’s second assignment, I will not discuss it, but merely make the passing comment that it, too, lacks merit.