Court Opinion

ID: 9545997
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:23:26.73629+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:15:53.062805
License: Public Domain

SCHAUFER, J.
I concur in the judgment. I agree with the holding of the majority opinion that the federal maritime law governs the cause of action and that the evidence is not insufficient, as a matter of law,-to support a finding of negligence on the part of plaintiff as well as on that of the operator of defendant’s tugboat. Where both .vessels are at fault the damages are to be equally divided, irrespective of the degree of fault. (The Marian (1933), 66 F.2d 354, 357.) Since the damages were not equally divided here but were apparently assessed upon the theory.of apportioning the loss in accordance with the fault, the judgment must be reversed.
Both plaintiff’s and defendant’s vessels were under way at all times concerned (see Preliminary Definitions, paragraph I, Inland Rules) but there is a conflict in the evidence as to whether, up to a few moments before the collision, plaintiff’s vessel was under command and was making way through the water. According to plaintiff his boat had not been under command and had not been making way through the water for .some five or six minutes prior to the time when the barge had approached within 25 or 80 feet of him. But the master of defendant’s tug testified that he had watched plaintiff continuously during the closing of a gap of at least one-quarter of a mile; that plaintiff had “held his course and speed”; that before the collision the tug with its tow had lost way completely and that it was plaintiff’s boat which ran into the barge.
Regardless of all other rules which may have been involved it is obvious that plaintiff could be found, either upon his own testimony or upon that of defendant’s master, to have been guilty of negligence in failing to keep á proper lookout for approaching vessels. Likewise upon the testimony of either plaintiff or the tug’s master it.could be found that the latter was inattentive or unskillful or otherwise negligent in bringing his cumbersome and unwieldy .tow so close to plaintiff’s boat as to involve immediate risk of collision under any of the circumstances shown. If plaintiff’s boat- was not under command that fact should have been apparent to an "experienced, *384competent, and attentive officer in the pilot house of defendant’s tug in ample time to have permitted avoidance of the collision and if, on the other hand, plaintiff’s boat was under command and making way through the water then it would seem to be a reasonable inference that the master of the tug was negligent in not having sooner recognized, or acted upon the fact, that risk of collision was involved in the holding of course and speed by both the tow and plaintiff’s boat after the latter had failed to answer a crossing signal which called for it to cross the bow of the tow from starboard to port and where its compass bearing remained constant.
I do not see how the instruction quoting section 284 of the California Harbors and Navigation Code could possibly have prejudiced the defendant. According to the master of defendant’s tugboat he sounded one blast of the whistle calling for each boat to alter her course to starboard and to leave the other to port. This is in accord with the California code rule as well as with rule I of article 18 of the Inland Rules. It does not necessarily appear, however, that the situation was controlled by such rule I.
Rule I of article 18 applies to passing vessels, that is, to vessels “approaching each other [italics added] head and head ... or nearly so. . . . It does not apply by day to cases in which a vessel sees another ahead crossing her own course, or by night” where the same relative positions are shown by the running lights. It was the latter situation which almost certainly was present here. Plaintiff’s boat was coming from Fisherman’s Wharf, from the vicinity of Pier 45. Defendant’s tow was coming from Tiburón on a course to dock at Pier 45 against an ebb tide. Necessarily, until they had crossed, plaintiff’s boat was to starboard of defendant’s tug and barge, and, as was to be expected, that is where the master of the tug said that he first saw plaintiff’s boat. He said that he saw several fishing boats on his starboard side, “well inside, towards Aquatic Park” and that plaintiff’s boat was one of two which “steered in such a direction as to cross my bow.” At that time a distance of about one-half mile separated plaintiff’s boat and defendant’s tow. Plaintiff under article 19 (Inland Rules) had the right of way. “When two steam vessels, [under the statutory definition both plaintiff’s boat and defendant’s tug were “steam vessels”] are crossing, so as to involve risk of collision, the vessel which has the *385other on her own starboard side shall keep out of the way of the other.”
Apparently, it was at about the time that plaintiff’s boat reached a position nearly dead ahead of the tow that plaintiff’s engine stopped. Either his engine stopped or he altered his course from a crossing course to a passing course. In either event it is obvious that his angle on the bow of defendant’s craft ceased to change and the preliminary provision of the Steering and Sailing Rules became applicable. That provision is (Inland Rules, § IY): “Risk of collision can, when circumstances permit, be ascertained by carefully watching the compass bearing of an approaching vessel. If the bearing does not appreciably change, such risk should be deemed to exist.” The master of the tug apparently recognized this risk when the boats were about one-quarter mile from each other. He testified that he first signaled the fishing boat when they were “a good quarter of a mile” apart. He said, “When I saw that he had not altered his course [apparently meaning compass bearing], when I blew this one whistle, then naturally I gave orders to the men to come to the right.”
The one blast of the whistle called for plaintiff to cross the bow of defendant’s tow so that the vessels would cross or pass port to port. That signal was not answered. The failure to answer it, coupled with no change in compass bearing, should at once have been recognized as evidencing “risk of collision.” Prompt action by defendant’s master, at the distance then separating the vessels, it would seem, could have averted the collision.
Although certain instructions were erroneous I do not believe that any of the instructions complained of were prejudicially erroneous except insofar as they authorized the jury to equitably apportion the loss if they found “that there was a great disparity in fault.” As it is obvious that the jury did undertake to equitably apportion the loss the judgment cannot stand.
For the above stated reasons only I concur in the judgment of reversal.
Appellant’s petition for a rehearing was denied June 21, 1945.