National Motorship Corp. v. Pennsylvania R. Co‪.‬

The Pennsylvania Railroad Company appeals from an interlocutory decree in the admiralty, holding it solely liable for a collision in New York Harbor off the Battery upon a clear afternoon on Christmas Day, 1944. The railroads tug, "Chester," was rounding the Battery, bound up the East River with a railroad float on her port hand; the collision was between the starboard corner of the float and the starboard bow of the motor vessel, "Clevelander," which was coming down the East River, also rounding the Battery, and bound for Edgewater, New Jersey. The testimony was, as is usual in such cases, completely at odds, and it would be impossible for us to reach any certain conclusion from the printed record; thus it is especially proper to treat as final the findings of the judge who saw all the witnesses. The most important of these are that the collision took place about 100 feet off the Ellis Island ferry rack; that the vessels first sighted each other when they were 1000 feet apart; that the "Clevelander" was on a course about 100 feet off the pier ends; and that the "Chester" was on a course between 200 and 300 feet off the pier ends. Upon these findings, as the judge said, clearly the vessels "were in a position to pass safely port to port." The "Clevelander" did not blow a passing signal to the "Chester," when she first saw her emerge from behind the ends of the sheds on the piers, or at any time; she waited without doing anything until the "Chester" volunteered a two blast signal. The reason for this inaction was that her master interpreted the situation as a crossing case, because the "Chester" bore on his starboard bow, and he supposed it to be his duty to keep his course and speed. Before the Inspectors, four days after the collision, when asked to explain why he accepted the "chesters" two blasts, he answered: "because I didnt have room enough to given him a danger signal and hold my course and speed which the rules of the road told me to do. I had the right of way. I had him on my port hand. The rule says that the vessel which has the other on her own port shall hold her course and speed." Again: "the law tells me to hold my course and speed." Again: "at the time I saw that tug and float, there was no need to blow my whistle. He was so far off from me and going across my bow that there was no need to do anything other than to keep my course." It is true that at the trial he changed this account of the collision, and said that the situation appeared to him to be a port to port passing as soon as he saw the "Chester"; but this we cannot accept in the absence of a finding in his favor. After an interval which the "Clevelanders" master described as "maybe half a minute" the "Chester" blew the double blast to which we have just alluded, and which she accompanied by a left rudder. How far apart the vessels then were we can only guess; their mutual approach was about five miles an hour, and, if they had been moving for "half a minute" before the "chester" turned, the distance must have been from 700 to 800 feet. The "Clevelander" immediately answered the "Chester" with a two blast signal and put her own rudder hard left. The "Chester" soon thereafter, apparently perceived that she could not carry out her proposal, blew the danger signal, and backed; this swung her float to starboard and brought its starboard corner into contact with the "Clevelanders" starboard bow.