by Christopher Hannan | Dec 29, 2016
“And there’s a mighty difference between a living thump and a dead thump.”
Moby Dick, Herman Melville
In a dramatic reversal of a prior and equally dramatic, watershed administrative decision of the Interior Bureau of Land Appeals (IBLA) upholding the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement’s (BSEE) regulatory jurisdiction over offshore contractors on the Outer Continental Shelf, the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana has overturned the IBLA’s ruling and stripped BSEE of that jurisdiction. Island Operating Co. v. Jewell et al., Case No. 16-145 (W.D. La. Dec. 23, 2016). Thus, under the Island Operating decision, BSEE may no longer wield what this blog has previously described as “the universal thump [it has previously] passed around” on offshore contractors; it has been rendered, at least for now, a “dead thump.” (more…)
by Christopher Hannan | Dec 13, 2016
– Moby Dick, Or The Whale, Herman Melville
The past eighteen to twenty-four months have seen a tectonic shift of focus (as well as a plethora of industry-generated white papers) by virtually every governmental regulatory entity, NGO, and industry group in the maritime world (up to and including the President of the United States) to the amorphous and dynamic issue of maritime “cybersecurity,” a term that covers a large waterfront of potential threats. (more…)
by Christopher Hannan | Nov 29, 2016
In an eminently reasonable, but apparently (surprisingly) res nova decision, the United States Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal has clarified that the maritime collateral source rule does not allow for recovery of medical amounts billed but later written down by the medical providers. Deperrodil v. Bozovic Marine, Inc., —F.3d —, 2016 WL 6810728 (5th Cir. Nov. 17, 2016). (more…)
by Christopher Hannan | Mar 16, 2016
In 2006, the Fifth Circuit issued a landmark controversial opinion in Texaco Exploration & Production, Inc. v. AmClyde Engineered Products Co., 448 F.3d 760, 770 (5th Cir.) amended on reh’g, 453 F.3d 652 (5th Cir. 2006). The case concerned the loss of the 3,605 ton, $70 million South Deck Module of Texaco’s compliant tower Petronius platform (then the tallest man-made structure in the world, from seafloor to above-surface platform height) due to failure of a wire rope component during transfer of the module from a deck barge via a barge-mounted crane. Despite the fact that the operation involved the use of two vessels and the crane-assisted movement of the South Deck Module over water in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, the Fifth Circuit held that admiralty tort jurisdiction did not apply, and that the incident fell within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (“OCSLA”). Accordingly, the case was remanded for a jury trial (after a prior improvidently conducted bench trial in admiralty) pursuant to the law of Alabama (the state adjacent to the platform site), instead of general maritime law. (more…)
by Christopher Hannan | Mar 3, 2016
The United States Coast Guard Rear Admiral Paul Thomas recently penned an article for the Marine News magazine, February 2016 edition, highlighting the Coast Guard’s “priorities” for 2016. The article is available at the Coast Guard’s Maritime Commons blog, as well as at the Marine News website. (more…)
