Okeeffe v. Atlantic Stevedoring Co‪.‬

William Curry was a longshoreman employed by the appellee, Atlantic Stevedoring Company, at the Port of Savannah, Georgia. On October 30, 1962, he was assisting in the loading of rolls of paper from a dock into the hold of a vessel. Each roll of paper was bound by two metal bands, one around each end of the roll, with a band of metal through the core and then around the roll lengthwise and outside of the bands around the circumference. Curry was engaged in attaching to the rolls of paper a device known as "Baltimore Dogs" which permitted the rolls to be firmly held while being hoisted over the ships side and lowered into the hold by means of the ships boom. After the dogs had been attached to one roll and it was being lifted from the dock, one of the circumference bands slipped off the roll, caught Curry by the leg and lifted him, as well as the roll of paper, from the dock. He was carried, head down, up and out from the dock. The winch operator, alerted by the hollering of other employees, stopped the winch. Curry dropped into the water of the slip between the dock and the vessel. When taken from the water Curry was dead. His skull had been fractured but it was ascertained that the cause of death was drowning.