O'Keefe v. Tice
Opinion of the Court
The schooner was beating into Delaware Bay through the entrance between the Breakwater and Overfalls
The main contention for the defense is that after the schooner had crossed the bows of the tug, standing to the eastward on the port tack, she failed to run her tack out and came about too soon, thus improperly embarrassing the tug. The schooner’s explanation is that she was as close to the Overfalls Shoals as her navigator thought it prudent to go. It is not necessary to determine whether this be so or not, and the testimony, read in connection with the chart, would seem to indicate that she might have stood on further without risk of stranding. A sailing vessel, even with abundant sea room ahead, is not bound to run out
“The sloop was entitled to assume that the tug was navigating with a proper lookout, and with reasonable attention to the obligations laid upon her. If, under that assumption, the sloop’s maneuver was not calculated to mislead or embarrass the tug, it is immaterial whether or not she ran out her port tack. The testimony shows that she had gone about and filled upon the starboard tack before collision. The disputed question is whether there was abundant time and space to enable the tug, seeing her maneuver, to keep out of the way.”
And we held the tug liable because the sloop had sailed on her new tack a distance which gave the tug ample time to conform her own navigation to the sloop’s course, if she had seen the latter come about as she should have done. In the cause at bar the navigator of the schooner did not come about immediately after crossing the tug’s bow. According to the testimony of those on the tug he held on for 15 minutes longer, till he ran out of their sight, and it was 10 or 15 minutes after that when they saw him coming back on the starboard tack. He ran so far to the eastward that, when he did come about, his new course, without the slightest assistance from the tug, carried him so far astern of her that he would easily have cleared the second tow, which, because of the insufficient light on the Drifton, was the last one he expected to find. The propriety of his navigation is to be tested by the conditions under which it was decided upon. He was not in fault for- not making out the lights of the Drifton before he came about. He was far enough to the eastward to clear all he had seen, or had reason to expect, and he was entitled to rely on assistance from the tug as soon as his new course was taken. "The navigator of the tug did not see the schooner" come about. How long afterward it was before he again picked her up is not entirely clear. His navigation, however, is to be tested by what he was bound to expect. He knew she was beating in, and that there were shoals to the eastward, which might be expected to set her on the starboard tack again. On a night such as this her lights could have been seen soon after she was on the new course. The tug’s course was known. The northerly limit of the schooner’s course beating up on a wind not exactly steady, but blowing freshly from a general north-northeasterly direction, was reasonably inferable. If the enormous length of the tow made it doubtful whether the schooner could clear it while holding her new course, it was for the tug to shape her own course so that the schooner would not collide with the tow. The witnesses for the tug undertake to show that when the schooner was sighted on her new course there were no indications of danger; that both vessels were red to red,, and moving on substantially opposite courses. In our opinion, the weight of evidence is to the contrary. The witnesses from the schooner all testify that after they got about, and shaped the new course, the tug was on their starboard bow, and thus red to green. Moreover, it is very evident that the vessels were not on opposite courses with that wind. Putting them on crossing courses (remembering that the tug concedes that when the schooner was seen again on her new tack she was still on the port bow of the -tug), it will be found that after the change of course the schooner’s green light must have been exhibited to the tug, and the
The decree of the District Court is affirmed, with interest and costs.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- THE PRUDENCE. O'KEEFE v. TICE
- Status
- Published