Court Opinion

ID: 9472168
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 03:51:55.420052+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:42:47.221088
License: Public Domain

*770VANCE, Circuit Judge:
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s rejection of admiralty jurisdiction. Plaintiff alleges the negligent damaging of a cargo’s crating while aboard a cargo ship on the high seas, resulting in injury to the plaintiff before the cargo was unloaded at its final destination and hence before it had come to rest. Conceding that the question is close, I would rule that plaintiff’s alleged injury bears the necessary significant relationship to maritime activity.
In its application of the Kelly factors, the majority chooses to focus on the situation existing at the precise moment of injury. By so doing it underplays the pro-admiralty jurisdiction tendencies of the first two Kelly factors. While the plaintiff’s role and functions were unconnected with maritime activity, those of both the time-charterer and owner were closely connected, particularly at the time of the damage to the crate. Cf. Sohyde at 1136. The Tropic Day, on board which the crate was damaged, is directly connected with maritime activity, and the air compressor and crate constituted cargo on board the Tropic Day when the negligence occurred.