Court Opinion

ID: 9488977
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 13:01:15.765206+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:53:13.444906
License: Public Domain

WALD, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
In the cause of halting the “tort liability creep,” the majority reverses the district court’s decision that Air France committed “reckless disregard” by leaving Mohammad Ali Saba’s (“Saba”) improperly packaged carpets out in the rain and so may not avail itself of the Warsaw Convention’s liability cap for damaged cargo.1 The district court first set forth the standard for “reckless disregard” as used in the context of the Warsaw Convention: ‘“willful misconduct is the intentional performance of an act with knowledge that the act will probably result in an injury or damage, or in some manner as to imply reckless disregard of the consequences of its performance.’” Saba v. Compagnie Nationale Air France, 866 F.Supp. 588, 593 (D.D.C.1994) (quoting In re Korean Air Lines Disaster of Sept. 1, 1983, 932 F.2d 1475, 1479 (D.C.Cir.) [hereinafter “Korean Air Lines ”], cert. denied sub nom. Dooley v. Korean Air Lines, Ltd., 502 U.S. 994, 112 S.Ct. 616, 116 L.Ed.2d 638 (1991)). It then concluded that the manner in which Air France handled Saba’s cargo “demonstrated a reckless disregard of the consequences of its performance.” Id. at 594. In overturning this ruling, my colleagues make two points. First, finding that the district court misapprehended the correct legal standard for reckless disregard as used in the context of the Warsaw Convention, they advance a new — and to my view, somewhat confusing— “subjective” standard for “reckless disregard.” Second, they go on to find that Saba failed to satisfy this subjective test. I disagree on both counts, and accordingly, dissent.
I.
The majority’s new standard for reckless disregard first of all lacks precision. Although the majority themselves disparage prior precedent for a lack of clarity, see Majority opinion (“Maj. op.”) at 667, it seems to me that they only further confuse the question of what a plaintiff bringing suit under the Warsaw Convention must establish to prevail on a claim of reckless disregard. My colleagues repeatedly stress that they are adopting a “subjective” test for reckless disregard in order to preserve its limited *672function of “providing a proxy for willful misconduct’s scienter requirement,” id. at 667, and claim that permitting a plaintiff to establish reckless disregard solely by presentation of “objective evidence” (presumably evidence that a reasonable carrier would have known of the substantial risk created by her actions, which in turn permits the inference that the defendant should have known of this risk), without proof of a defendant’s subjective awareness of the likely consequences of her act, would impermissibly broaden this exception to the Convention’s liability cap. Id. at 668. Yet they never hone in precisely on what their subjective test requires, or how a plaintiff can satisfy it. At some points, the panel opinion seems to suggest that a plaintiff must prove a carrier had actual knowledge that its actions posed a substantial risk of harm,2 but at other points, it appears to acknowledge that judges or juries may infer this subjective knowledge of consequences from the circumstances of the contested action3 — a concession that makes their standard in practical terms indistinguishable from the one set forth in our past cases and used by the district court. See, e.g., Korean Air Lines, 932 F.2d at 1479 (“[w]illful misconduct is the intentional performance of an act ... in some manner as to imply reckless disregard of the consequences of its performance”); KLM Royal Dutch Airlines Holland v. fuller, 292 F.2d 775, 778 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 368 U.S. 921, 82 S.Ct. 243, 7 L.Ed.2d 136 (1961) (same); American Airlines, Inc. v. Ulen, 186 F.2d 529, 533 (D.C.Cir.1949) (“[a] violation [of safety rules] ... done with a wanton and reckless disregard of the consequences” constitutes willful misconduct); Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 593 (“willful misconduct is the intentional performance of an act ... in some manner as to imply reckless disregard of the consequences of its performance”). In these parts of the opinion, the majority draws from other areas of the law, such as securities law: “ ‘[this] kind of recklessness ... is an extreme departure from the standards of ordinary care, ... which presents a danger of misleading buyers or sellers that is either known to the defendant or is so obvious that the actor must have been aware of it’ ” Maj. op. at 668 (quoting SEC v. Steadman, 967 F.2d 636, 641-42 (D.C.Cir.1992) (internal quotations omitted; emphasis added)). Steadman does indicate that the level of risk created by the actor must be “extreme” in order to qualify as reckless disregard. Contrary to the majority’s reading, however, it does not provide an unqualified escape hatch for a defendant *673who counters with evidence that he did not understand the likely consequences of his actions. Instead, it stands only for the proposition that if a defendant has taken steps to discern these consequences — in Steadman’s case, securing a legal opinion that federal SEC rules did not require him to “book” liabilities for non-compliance with state securities laws — then his failure to obtain additional information or to accurately predict those consequences, while perhaps negligent, cannot be adjudged “extremely reckless.” Steadman, 967 F.2d at 641-42 (finding Steadman’s company did not act with extreme recklessness because its decision not to register under state laws or book liabilities for failure to do so was based on “formal, unqualified opinion letter” from attorney, which was also relied upon by “a partner at one of the country’s largest accounting firms who had substantial expertise in mutual fund accounting and auditing”). Thus, even in Steadman, the standard ultimately still turns on how the actor’s behavior comports with an objective standard of ordinary care.
In sum, the majority’s “subjective” standard of reckless disregard requires awareness by the carrier of the likely consequences of its actions, but permits an inference of that state of mind from circumstances in which the carrier departs in an extreme fashion from standards of ordinary care. I agree that either direct or circumstantial evidence of this kind of heedless indifference may suffice to show reckless disregard. I also agree that it takes a grievous malfeasance to justify an inference of reckless disregard. A de minimis departure from standards of ordinary care would not suffice; if, for example, a carrier directed its cargo handlers to cover the bottom of a pallet with a plastic sheet that reaches 3 feet up the edge of the pallet, but the handler used a sheet that was an inch too short, this departure from ordinary care might constitute negligence, but would certainly not be extreme enough to warrant a finding of reckless disregard.4 But my basic problem is that this is already the law, the same law we have long applied in this court and that the district court applied here.
In at least two past cases, this circuit has based a finding of “reckless disregard” on objective evidence that the carrier should have known its actions posed a substantial risk of harm. The majority admits as much, but tries to sweep away these precedents by declaring that “[i]n some of these cases it is not apparent that the conduct involved was beyond negligence, but we have never held that negligence — gross or otherwise — would suffice to make out willful misconduct.” Maj. op. at 667 (citation omitted). I’m not at all sure what that means. Where does gross negligence end and extreme departure from ordinary care begin? My colleagues do not see fit to enlighten me, but I think it worthwhile to look to precedent for the answer. In Ulen, this court upheld a jury verdict of reckless disregard based on evidence showing that the aircraft’s pilot caused the plane to crash by devising and executing a flight plan which called for the plane to fly at an altitude of 4,000 feet, over a mountain with an elevation of 4,080 feet. The court did so despite claims by the carrier that the pilot had not known the height of the mountain, had flown this course several times before, and had identified a safe course that would fall within the parameters of the plan but still avoid crashing into the mountain — all of which suggest that although a reasonable pilot would know of the substantial risks posed by the flight plan, the carrier’s pilot could certainly not have been aware of the likely consequences of his actions. Similarly, in Tuller, then-Circuit Judge Burger sustained a verdict of reckless disregard based on the actions of several employees: one turned off a radio on the ground that monitored messages from the aircraft and then failed to advise the appropriate officials of a *674break in radio contact as soon as he became aware of the problem; another faded to fasten his seat belt as required by regulations, and was thus unable to send a distress signal after being thrown from his seat; others failed to instruct passengers about the location or use of life vests in the plane; and still others failed to take adequate steps to rescue an imperiled passenger after the plane crashed. With respect to none of these actions did the court mention any evidence that the carrier’s employees actually appreciated the risk their actions created; the only logical inference is that their behavior was reckless because any reasonable airline employee would have realized that such acts (or omissions) posed a grave risk of harm.5 Other areas of law employ a similar standard for findings of recklessness, so that parties cannot “evade liability through deliberate ignorance or careless disregard of the accuracy and veracity of their claims.” United States v. TDC Management Corp., Inc., 24 F.3d 292, 297 (D.C.Cir.1994); see also Farmer v. Brennan, — U.S. -, -, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 1978, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994) (“The civil law generally calls a person reckless who acts ... in the face of an unjustifiably high risk of harm that is either known or so obvious that it should be known.” (emphasis added; citations omitted)); In re Holloway, 995 F.2d 1080, 1082 (D.C.Cir.1993) (wrongful intent in context of contempt proceedings requires “ ‘a volitional act done by one who knows or should reasonably be aware that his conduct is wrongful’” (quoting United States v. Greyhound Corp., 508 F.2d 529, 531-32 (7th Cir.1974) (emphasis added)), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 114 S.Ct. 1537, 128 L.Ed.2d 190 (1994); United States v. Wallace, 964 F.2d 1214, 1220 (D.C.Cir.1992) (sanetionable attorney conduct “requires deliberate action in the face of a known risk, the likelihood or impact of which the actor inexcusably underestimates or ignores”).6
In conclusion, I cannot fathom what the majority’s “subjective” standard adds to our circuit precedent, which already permits a court to find reckless disregard if a carrier’s performance deviates so significantly from standards of ordinary care as to imply reckless disregard for the consequences of its action. The only result it might accomplish, in theory, is to exclude from the definition of “reckless disregard” those situations where a reasonable employee should have but did not understand that her actions posed a substantial risk of harm to a shipper’s goods. Cf. Steadman, 967 F.2d at 642. But this rule would permit a carrier to systematically handle its shippers’ goods with virtually total disregard for their security, if it can show that its employees lacked subjective knowledge of the risk they have created. The resulting not-so-benign neglect will cost the carriers almost nothing — $9.00 per pound of *675damaged goods — at least until their reputation suffers so much that transit revenues drop, but it will expose shippers to egregious risks of harm without adequate compensation.
And in practice, the subjective test will never stray far afield from the objective one. If the majority concedes the legitimacy of an inference of subjective knowledge of consequences from extreme circumstances, the dividing line between these two standards all but evaporates. Since intent can be inferred from circumstances, we are really saying to parties that if your behavior deviates substantially from the norm, we will assume that you knew your actions created a very substantial risk of harm to others. Although the majority might in individual eases require a more extreme departure from ordinary care in order to infer subjective awareness of substantial risk than that required in our past cases, or by the district court here, the difference between its construction of reckless disregard and the district court’s comes down in the end to just that — how badly a carrier must behave before an inference of subjective knowledge of likely disastrous consequences will be permitted. I think the district court got it right — both the standard for reckless disregard, and the amount of “bad behavior” needed to make the required inference of reckless disregard — under existing law and sound tort principles.
II.
My second problem with my colleagues’ opinion is this: even assuming that a plaintiff seeking relief from the Warsaw Convention’s liability limits must show that the carrier was subjectively aware of the substantial risk created by its actions, either through direct or circumstantial evidence, it would not have been clearly erroneous for the district court to infer from the evidence presented at this trial that Dynair employees working at Dulles Airport knew Saba’s obviously ill-packaged carpets were substantially likely to be damaged if left outside in the rain. Thus, even under its “subjective” standard for reckless disregard, the majority should have affirmed the district court’s ruling for Saba.7
Air France instructs its employees in minute detail how to package humidity- or weather-sensitive cargo. See Air France Aircraft Handling and Loading Operational Regulations, reprinted in Joint Appendix at A47-A68. These guidelines, characterized in Air France’s cargo handling manual as “a must in order to ... avoid the risk of damage to packages and ensure quality of service to cargo customers,” id. at 1, explain to its cargo handlers how to transport shipped goods so as to minimize the possibility of damage. For example, they direct handlers to transport cargo in containers rather than on pallets, “if the nature of cargo justifies it: [e.p.,] cargo to be fully protected against weather,” id. at 4, or if the cargo is likely to create an unstable stack, such as “rolls of textiles,” id. at 17, 18. The cargo handlers’ manual also includes extensive guidelines for safeguarding pallet cargo against the elements. All cargo pallets “must be protected from weather by a cover (plastic sheet 4 to 6 m/15 to 20 ft wide) installed over the top and the sides before installing the net”; accompanying illustrations show a cover which fully protects the sides and is secured to the edges of the pallet base. Id. at 20. This single covering is sufficient to protect “metal containers or any cargo which is not sensitive to humidity,” but humidity-sensitive cargo, including “carpet [and] rugs,” requires the additional protection of a double cover. Id. *676The guidelines stipulate that it is particularly important to “protect the lower parts of the pallet, where accumulating water often results in damage.” Id. The illustrations and directions accompanying the guidelines instruct employees to spread a plastic sheet over the base of the pallet with an excess of three feet of sheeting around the edges, before any packages are loaded. After the stack reaches a height of about three feet, the bottom sheet must be folded up to cover the stack and secured with tape or staples if necessary. The top packages are then loaded, another plastic sheet is placed on top and affixed to the stack, and the entire pallet is covered with a net that fastens to the pallet base. Id. at 21. The regulations also describe at some length how to load goods on a pallet and cover the pallet for travel, cautioning that a load must be distributed evenly over the pallet to avoid deformation of the pallet’s base. Id. at 14.
A review of the record fully corroborates the district court’s finding that Air France did not even come close to complying with these cargo handling regulations when it packaged Saba’s carpets. Even though the airbills identified the cargo contents as carpets — a humidity-sensitive item — Air France loaded some of them onto pallets, shipping the carpets on two pallets and three containers. Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 590, 593-94. Air France did not provide a double cover for the pallets or completely cover the tops and sides of pallets with a single plastic sheet, as required by its own handling regulations. Id. at 594. At trial, Saba testified that the first pallet he unwrapped at Dulles Airport was “loosely” covered with plastic across the top and first two or three layers of bales. Transcript (“Tr.”) of Jan. 25,1993, at 27; see also Tr. of Jan. 25, 1993, at 118 (testimony of Linda Nakumura, Customs Inspector). The bottom of the pallet was not covered with any plastic sheeting. Id. at 33 (testimony of Saba); see also id. at 145 (testimony of Mitchell). The second pallet was also covered with a “loose piece of plastic tied down by just a block on the top.” Id. at 33; see also id. at 146. Under the plastic was netting, as well as a piece of plastic that came half-way down the sides of the stack. Id. at 34; see also id. at 147-48. As with the first pallet, Saba found no plastic covering on the bottom. Id. at 35; see also id. at 150. Nor had Air France reinforced the floor of the pallets with wooden blocks or other supports as recommended in its regulations, which may have contributed to the puddles of standing water on the floor of the pallets. Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 594. The containers did not fare much better. Air France used net doors to cover the containers’ openings, rather than rigid ones. The doors on all three containers hung open at the top, creating a gap of “four feet or five feet,” Tr. of Jan. 25, 1993, at 94, and leaving the interior “completely exposed,” Tr. of Jan. 25,1993, at 37; see also id. at 153-57. The top of one container also had a hole of about three inches in diameter. Id. at 156; see also Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 594.
The record indicates that these packaging problems were so conspicuous as to be immediately apparent to an observer on either side of the Atlantic. Yet despite these manifest deficiencies, when the carpets arrived at Dulles, Dynair employees stored the carpets outside for five days until Saba picked them up on October 1,1990,8 placing only an extra sheet of plastic loosely on the top part of the two pallets. During this time, .34 inches of rain — a rainfall described by a Dynair employee as “a hell of a rainstorm,” Tr. of Jan. 25, 1993, at 144 — fell at Dulles Airport. Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 590. As a result of exposure to the rain, a large number of the rugs were soaking wet when Saba retrieved them, particularly those on the bottom and sides of each stack. Id. at 592. As each pallet was unloaded, Saba discovered approximately one-half inch of standing water in the pallet’s basin, and a depression in the center, where still more water had collected. In the containers, the bales close to the door were soaked, while those farther on the inside remained dry. Tr. of Jan. 25, 1993, at 38. After drying the carpets out, Saba found that 86 of the carpets had sustained permanent *677water damage, an estimate later confirmed by Air France’s own appraiser. Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 592.
It seems indisputable to me that on the basis of this evidence, the district court was warranted in drawing two conclusions: first, that the violations of Air France’s cargo handling regulations and the resulting woefully inadequate packaging of the cargo were so substantial and obvious to the Dynair employees who placed them outdoors as to make their awareness of the potentially damaging consequences from rain undeniable9; and second, that storing carpets packaged this way outdoors, despite a forecast of rain, was such an extreme departure from ordinary standards of care as to warrant, if not mandate, an inference that Dynair employees had to recognize the substantial risk created by their actions. The majority suggests that the district court predicated its finding of reckless disregard on a combination or cumulation of isolated, minor mistakes made by Air France employees in Austria and Air France agents employed by Dynair at Dulles Airport.10 Maj. op. at 666, 670. I read the district court’s line of reasoning differently, as resting on the fact that the deficiencies in packaging were so apparent to the plain eye that Air France’s agents at Dulles had to have recognized the packaging problems and known that the carpets would almost certainly sustain water damage if stored outdoors when rain was forecast. Thus, even under the reckless disregard standard set forth by the majority (as best I can understand it), the district court’s ruling for Saba should have been affirmed.
The majority tips its hand in cautioning against the use of an ex post perspective, which compensates plaintiffs because their injuries arouse our sympathies, instead of an ex ante vantage point which looks to the impact of a judicial decision on overall social welfare. The property damage sustained by Saba in this case does not, of course, equate with the harm suffered by passengers and their families in prior Article 25 cases adjudicated by this court. Faced with property damage instead of death or severe bodily injury, it is perhaps tempting to cut back on precedent which establishes a broader standard for reckless disregard and use this ease as an opportunity to curtail the tort liability of air transport companies. But such an ex ante calculus inevitably slights the interests of future passengers and shippers who will bear the burden of this decision. If we absolve Air France today from the duty of compensation for its egregious disregard of a shipper’s goods, we cultivate a culture of “benign neglect,” forcing customers to shoulder the costs of cumulative negligence of many employees performing compartmentalized functions which nevertheless culminate in a grievous risk to the passenger or shipper. My colleagues cite the specter of “creeping tort liability” — I worry about “creeping unaccountability.” I respectfully dissent.

. The Warsaw Convention generally limits a carrier’s liability for goods damaged in international transit to approximately $9.00 per pound. Article 25 of the Convention, however, allows for recovery of full compensatory damages if a carrier engages in "willful misconduct":
The carrier shall not be entitled to avail himself of the provisions of this convention which exclude or limit his liability, if the damage is caused by his wilful misconduct or by such default on his part as, in accordance with the law of the court to which the case is submitted, is considered to be equivalent to wilful misconduct.
Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules Relating to International Transportation by Air, Oct. 12, 1929, T.S. No. 876 (1934), reprinted in 49 U.S.C.App. § 1502 note (1988) [hereinafter “Warsaw Convention"]. As the majority recognizes, this circuit has long interpreted "willful misconduct" to include "reckless disregard,” in line with the English translation of the original French text of the Convention.

. The majority quotes a district court opinion affirming a finding of reckless disregard based on the intentional actions of a carrier for the proposition that " 'the wrongdoer must consciously be aware of his wrongdoing, i.e., the actor must not only intend to do the act found to be wrongful but also must know that his conduct is wrongful.' ” Maj. op. at 668 (quoting In re Korean Air Lines Disaster of September 1, 1983, 704 F.Supp. 1135, 1136 (D.D.C.1988) (emphasis added)). The majority then paraphrases the district court's opinion with approval as follows: "besides showing that the defendant intends the act which ultimately causes the harm, a plaintiff must prove that the defendant was subjectively aware of the consequences of his act — not necessarily that it would cause the exact injury, but at least that it was certainly likely to cause an injury to plaintiff." Id. (emphasis added). Although both these sentences suggest that a plaintiff must prove actual awareness on the defendant’s part, they also pose an additional conundrum for future litigants: awareness of what? To the extent that the term "wrongful" encompasses a judgment about the morality of one’s action, not simply an understanding of its likely consequences, see Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 2642 (1976) (defining "wrongful” as "injurious, unjust, unfair”); see also id. at 2641 (a wrong act is one that is "immoral” or "unethical”), awareness of the wrongful nature of one’s conduct and awareness of the consequences of one's actions are certainly not the same thing. Nor are the two terms coterminous if "wrongfulness" is understood as referring to the legality of an action. For instance, an actor may realize that running a red light at midnight on a lonely road is "wrongful,” in that it is illegal, but be blissfully unaware of any likelihood of disaster until a truck comes barreling over the hill and into the intersection at top speed.

. In suggesting that subjective knowledge can be inferred from the actions of a carrier, the majority quotes further from the district court’s Korean Air Lines opinion: "As is apparent, however, both by the nature of the problem of proving an actor's intent and by the formulation equating a 'reckless disregard of the consequences' with intentional wrongdoing, the actor’s intent may be inferred from indirect evidence and the reckless nature of his acts.” Id. (quoting Korean Air Lines, 704 F.Supp. at 1136); see also Maj. op. at 668 (recldess disregard functions “as an effort to alleviate problems of proof of willful misconduct”).

. The district court, in setting forth the standard for reckless disregard, stated that “a finding of willful misconduct is appropriate when the act or omission constitutes a violation of a rule or regulation of the defendant carrier itself.” Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 593 (citing Bank of Nova Scotia v. Pan American Airlines, 16 Avi. 17, 378 (S.D.N.Y. 1981)). Not every violation of a carrier’s rule or regulation rises to the level of reckless disregard, however. As explained in the text, a carrier’s failure to comply with its own rules and regulations constitutes reckless disregard only if the violation represents an extreme departure from the standard of care mandated by the regulation.

. In Korean Air Lines, our most recent case concerning the Convention's liability cap, this court found sufficient evidence to support a verdict of reckless disregard based on plaintiffs' allegations that a flight crew had deliberately concealed repeated deviations from its flight path to avoid disciplinary sanctions. In approving plaintiffs' theory of "actual knowledge” of risk (termed the "primary theory” by the majority), however, the Korean Air Lines court at no point suggested that such knowledge was necessary to a finding of reckless disregard. Thus, contrary to the majority’s characterization of the case, see Maj. op. at 668 n. 3, the district court did not disavow the Korean Air Lines plaintiffs’ “alternative theory” of reckless disregard, which was based on failure to adhere to objective standards of reasonable care.

. This standard is also consistent with the Restatement (Second) of Torts, which defines "reckless disregard” as including
an act ... [performed] knowing or having reason to know of facts which would, lead a reasonable man to realize, not only that his conduct creates an unreasonable risk of physical harm to another, but also that such risk is substantially greater than that which is necessary to make his conduct negligent.
Restatement (Second) of Torts § 500 (1965) (emphasis added). The Restatement makes clear that an individual may be liable for reckless disregard if she
has such knowledge, or reason to know, of the facts, but does not realize or appreciate the high degree of risk involved, although a reasonable man in his position would do so. An objective standard is applied to him, and he is held to the realization of the aggravated risk which a reasonable man in his place would have, although he does not himself have it____ It is enough that he knows or has reason to know of circumstances which would bring home to the realization of the ordinary, reasonable man the highly dangerous character of his conduct.
Id. § 500 cmt. a, c (emphasis added).

. The majority mischaracterizes the district court’s opinion as finding Air France guilty of mere negligence, rather than reckless disregard. This argument is a proverbial red herring. To be sure, the district court at various points described Air France’s actions as displaying a "lack of judgment,” Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 594, and as showing "disregard of its own cargo-handling regulations as well as of plain common sense,” id. at 593. Although these statements by themselves could be read as suggesting that the court need only find negligence in order to rule for Saba, it is clear from other parts of its opinion that the district court clearly understood reckless disregard to require more than mere negligence. See id. at 594. Because the court identified the correct standard there, its remarks are more reasonably interpreted to mean not that Air France was guilty only of negligence, but that it had departed so significantly from the appropriate standard of care as to violate basic rules of common sense to which any ordinary person would adhere.

. At trial, Barfield Mitchell testified that Dynair’s explanation for storing the carpets outdoors was that they "couldn’t get it into the warehouse because of the fact we didn’t have any room in the warehouse, and we had to leave it out back.” Tr. of Jan. 25, 1993, at 159.

. Testimony by Air France’s own cargo surveyor confirms this conclusion; at trial, the surveyor stated that "a shipment packaged this way should not be placed in an open area with the threat of rain because it could be wet damaged.” Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 594.

. The majority describes this line of reasoning as "the district court's bunching together of the actions of two separate corporations, Air France and Dynair,” Maj. op. at 670. Dynair, however, acted as Air France's agent at Dulles Airport, Saba, 866 F.Supp. at 590, and thus under basic principles of agency law Air France is liable for Dynair’s handling of Saba's carpets — a point not contested by Air France in its briefs to this court.