Vessel salvage rules

joshtrucker said:
My enquiry was if a Shore side contract of work precluded a claim of salvage on a vessel.
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I think whilst not automatic its too nuanced a question to get a definitive answer. If you were to make a claim and they were to try and defend it they might well suggest that your role actually expected you to do other things in this situation - like contact senior management for advice or to seek the safest possible solution. I'm not sure if vessels this size have keys but assuming you some how accessed them was that the expected behaviour of an employee. Had "Professional Salvors Ltd" turned up and ask for those keys would you just have handed them over or would you have sought management instruction. Of course that might not mean you don't have a salvage claim, but it might mean that successful claim would see you fired for having expose the business to an unauthorised cost (especially one you benefit from) without consulting them!
joshtrucker said:
...I have a skippers ticket that allows me to take the workboat I moved, I happen not to be employed as a vessel skipper at the company I work.... the harbour master requested something be done with the vessels...
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Who did the harbour master think he was making the request to "Workboats Ltd" or "Josh Trucker" personally? Had you not happened to be qualified and competent to fix the issue what would either you have done or the HM have done? Had you got injured in the process would you have expected compensation from employer or HM or expected them to pay your whilst recovering. Because I'm not sure you can morally have it both ways.


FWIW, if you were my employees (or even "friends of employees") I'd have thanked you graciously and happily included a spot bonus in your paycheck (or our current favourite is a thank you card with Amazon gift card) as recognition for your efforts - we'd have done that unprompted. If you came to me saying you thought you deserved this and mentioned the salvage word you might find the sort of response that others have suggested! The magnitude of the "reward" you are seeking is very easy for a willing employer to do - make it £1000+ and it will be requiring all sorts of discussions and approvals and probably end up in their legal/accounting dept bureaucracy.
 
14K478 said:
I was a salvage lawyer.

Basically the rules are:

1. The salved property must be a recognised subject of salvage.

3. The vessel and or cargo must have been in danger. Risk of being held liable for damaging some other property does not count.

4. The vessel must have been brought to a place of safety and secured there.

4. The salvor must have been a volunteer. If you are the owner of a harbour tug employed to assist a ship then absent remarkable circumstances you cannot claim for salvage services rendered to that ship. If you are a member of the crew of a ship you cannot claim for salvage services rendered to your own ship - unless you have abandoned her with no hope of returning on board her (the case here is the “San Demetrio”, 1942)

Hope this helps, The current textbook is the late Geoffrey Brice QC’s “Maritime Law of Civil Salvage”.
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Right, the four tests:

1. The vessels were a recognised subject or salvage, because they were vessels and not on fresh water. You pass.

2. They were in danger, as opposed to endangering other vessels (they may have been doing that too, but it doesn’t help - there’s one case the other way - the “Whippingham”, but it’s generally thought to be a mistaken decision and bad law). You pass.

3. You brought them to a place of safety (this can include securing them alongside where they started). You pass.

4. You were a volunteer. You were not a member of their crews. You were asked to help by the harbour master, but that doesn’t stop you being a volunteer. Nor does your status as an employee of the company that owns the launches. You pass.

I think you have a salvage claim.

Now, there are three things that you can do:

1. Bring a claim at common law in the County Court. This will include serving a writ on the boats to arrest them to secure your claim.

2. Agree Lloyd’s Form of Salvage Agreement with the owner (this is a simple arbitration agreement with provisions for security for your claim).

3. Have a nice chat with your employer. This can obviously include (1) or (2).

If you were assisted by other people they have a claim too so it makes sense for you all to act together.

Depending on where you are in the country, you may or may not have a specialist shipping law firm near you. If you are in London or Ipswich, you are in luck.

Some years after I had stopped pretending to be a lawyer and had become the commercial manager of a fleet of ships one of our small container ships towed a disabled logger into Singapore, perfectly competently. I told the Master, whom I knew quite well, what to do next (sign up his crew so they all used the same lawyer, agree Lloyd’s Form, etc. I told Bernie to forget retiring to a country mansion but to expect a new car, and when we met again a couple of years later he told me that I had been quite right.

One last thing - there’s a time bar. You must start your claim either by issuing a Writ or by appointing an Arbitrator within two years of securing the boats safely. If you use Lloyd’s Form Lloyd’s Salvage Arbitration and Guarantees Branch do that for you automatically,
 
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14K478 said:
Right, the four tests:

1. The vessels were a recognised subject or salvage, because they were vessels and not on fresh water. You pass.

2. They were in danger, as opposed to endangering other vessels (they may have been doing that too, but it doesn’t help - there’s one case the other way - the “Whippingham”, but it’s generally thought to be a mistaken decision and bad law). You pass.

3. You brought them to a place of safety (this can include securing them alongside where they started). You pass.

4. You were a volunteer. You were not a member of their crews. You were asked to help by the harbour master, but that doesn’t stop you being a volunteer. Nor does your status as an employee of the company that owns the launches. You pass.

I think you have a salvage claim.

Now, there are three things that you can do:

1. Bring a claim at common law in the County Court. This will include serving a writ on the boats to arrest them to secure your claim.

2. Agree Lloyd’s Form of Salvage Agreement with the owner (this is a simple arbitration agreement with provisions for security for your claim).

3. Have a nice chat with your employer. This can obviously include (1) or (2).

If you were assisted by other people they have a claim too so it makes sense for you all to act together.

Depending on where you are in the country, you may or may not have a specialist shipping law firm near you. If you are in London or Ipswich, you are in luck.

Some years after I had stopped pretending to be a lawyer and had become the commercial manager of a fleet of ships one of our small container ships towed a disabled logger into Singapore, perfectly competently. I told the Master, whom I knew quite well, what to do next (sign up his crew so they all used the same lawyer, agree Lloyd’s Form, etc. I told Bernie to forget retiring to a country mansion but to expect a new car, and when we met again a couple of years later he told me that I had been quite right.

One last thing - there’s a time bar. You must start your claim either by issuing a Writ or by appointing an Arbitrator within two years of securing the boats safely. If you use Lloyd’s Form Lloyd’s Salvage Arbitration and Guarantees Branch do that for you automatically,
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If I were to assist someone I wouldn’t ask for compensation unless there was damage to my boat or crew....if I ever need assistance....I just hope that they don’t know you 😳🥺
 
14K478 said:
Right, the four tests:

1. The vessels were a recognised subject or salvage, because they were vessels and not on fresh water. You pass.

2. They were in danger, as opposed to endangering other vessels (they may have been doing that too, but it doesn’t help - there’s one case the other way - the “Whippingham”, but it’s generally thought to be a mistaken decision and bad law). You pass.

3. You brought them to a place of safety (this can include securing them alongside where they started). You pass.

4. You were a volunteer. You were not a member of their crews. You were asked to help by the harbour master, but that doesn’t stop you being a volunteer. Nor does your status as an employee of the company that owns the launches. You pass.

I think you have a salvage claim.

Now, there are three things that you can do:

1. Bring a claim at common law in the County Court. This will include serving a writ on the boats to arrest them to secure your claim.

2. Agree Lloyd’s Form of Salvage Agreement with the owner (this is a simple arbitration agreement with provisions for security for your claim).

3. Have a nice chat with your employer. This can obviously include (1) or (2).

If you were assisted by other people they have a claim too so it makes sense for you all to act together.

Depending on where you are in the country, you may or may not have a specialist shipping law firm near you. If you are in London or Ipswich, you are in luck.

Some years after I had stopped pretending to be a lawyer and had become the commercial manager of a fleet of ships one of our small container ships towed a disabled logger into Singapore, perfectly competently. I told the Master, whom I knew quite well, what to do next (sign up his crew so they all used the same lawyer, agree Lloyd’s Form, etc. I told Bernie to forget retiring to a country mansion but to expect a new car, and when we met again a couple of years later he told me that I had been quite right.

One last thing - there’s a time bar. You must start your claim either by issuing a Writ or by appointing an Arbitrator within two years of securing the boats safely. If you use Lloyd’s Form Lloyd’s Salvage Arbitration and Guarantees Branch do that for you automatically,
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Serious question 14k....can the owners of the barges in question just say, ok they are yours...and hand over the keys...making Josh responsible for the mooring fees, insurance, crew etc ?
 
joshtrucker said:
14k478, thanks for you replies, very informative. I take it you don't deal with salvage any more? For everyone following this I work for a faceless blue chip client.

Thanks
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Correct. I haven’t, for many years. I saw the writing on the wall for the sort of law that I enjoyed - salvage, collisions, and so on - as ships got safer, and decided that making my own mistakes was more fun.

This was my favourite salvage tug (mind you, she would roll on wet grass):

IMG_2793.jpeg
 
… and this was the one that got away:

IMG_2385.jpeg

The “Amoco Cadiz”. Some years later, the sister of this VLCC, the ex “Amoco Milford Haven”, renamed “Haven”, blew up outside Genoa, with heavy loss of life.

Her owner, Stelios Haji-Ioannou, gave up ships, and went on to found an airline - EasyJet.

I once heard him say “If you think safety is expensive, try an accident!”
 
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Bouba said:
Serious question 14k....can the owners of the barges in question just say, ok they are yours...and hand over the keys...making Josh responsible for the mooring fees, insurance, crew etc ?
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Yes, but that would be foolish unless they were so badly damaged that they were CTLs. It’s unheard of for a salvage award to exceed fifty per cent of the salved value and ten per cent is more usual.
 
And here’s big sister, 20,000 hp. Actually not a PR shot, but it encapsulates what a salvage tug was all about IMG_4264.gif
 
14k478 and ylop, thank you for your responses. This is what I had imagined joining this forum would be about. I love the tug pictures. I would of loved to have worked on a tug, especially in salvage, sadly I've only done work boats and passenger ferries.
 
Another favourite from my youth in the 1970s. Doeksens’ “Holland”. Built in 1949 from British war reparations after the RAF sank her predecessor which had been seized by the Germans in WW2. 3,000hp which was a big tug for the day. She is still with us, after a very long life, as a salvage tug, as a Rijkswaterstaat patrol vessel, and in recent years as an operating museum ship which goes to sea. She has been known to take a summer cruise round the Western Isles.

Unusually for a salvage tug, she has a passenger certificate for 700 deck passengers, because she was used to double up and provide extra capacity at peak times on her owners’ ferry service from Harlingen to Teschelling. She has always been kept “like a yacht” - a feast of scrubbed decks, varnished teak and polished brass, with her original Werkspoor diesel engine.


IMG_3988.jpeg
 
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colhel said:
Would the following be the same as the OPs situation?
I turn up at the marina, notice my neighbours sunseeker being banged against the pontoon so I adjust his fenders and lines to stop further damage, and then claim salvage
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When I posted this it was a bit tongue in cheek, but, are there any similarities to the OPs question?
joshtrucker said:
14k478, thanks for you replies, very informative. I take it you don't deal with salvage any more? For everyone following this I work for a faceless blue chip client.

Thanks
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I think sometimes even in small firms you have to blow your own trumpet to show your credentials as a conscientious employee. Also to stop someone else taking your efforts and sticking it to their own CV
 
One last favorite salvage tug; this is perhaps the most famous salvage tug of all time if you are British (if you are Canadian she will be the Foundation Josephine and if you are Dutch and you don't choose the Holland it will be one of Smit's or one of Wijsmuller's and if you are German I've already posted them above)

This handsome old lady was the TURMOIL, built as a WW2 rescue tug, then owned by Overseas Towage and Salvage Ltd and the heroine of the FLYING ENTERPRISE saga, whose heroes were Captain Carlssen of the FLYING ENTERPRISE and Chief Officer Keith Dancy of the tug below, I only got to know her in her old age as the MATSAS, as seen here. I do remember her carrying out a tow in in absolutely the classic manner - no agreeing LOF through a coast station - the Lloyds Open Form was signed by her Master, slid into a French letter, attached to the heaving line that carried the tow line messenger and signed by the casualty's Master and passed back the same way.



IMG_1920.jpeg
 
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Hi everyone, I thought for fun I would share my latest adventures. The nay sayers can criticise at will. Whilst driving a fast boat out of a mariner I was hailed by a passerby who was shouting for help. Assuming that someone was in the water I spun about and travelled where directed where I found a 25m wooden dive boat jammed between a pier and the mariner leg and doing damage. The vessel was unable to move so we established a tow and I dragged the vessel off the mariner and round against a pier leg. As last time I helped there was high winds. Despite the largest odds I would fail being a reckless imbecile everything was fine, the harbour master even thanked me.
 
14K478 said:
One last favorite salvage tug; this is perhaps the most famous salvage tug of all time if you are British (if you are Canadian she will be the Foundation Josephine and if you are Dutch and you don't choose the Holland it will be one of Smit's or one of Wijsmuller's and if you are German I've already posted them above)

This handsome old lady was the TURMOIL, built as a WW2 rescue tug, then owned by Overseas Towage and Salvage Ltd and the heroine of the FLYING ENTERPRISE saga, whose heroes were Captain Carlssen of the FLYING ENTERPRISE and Chief Officer Keith Dancy of the tug below, I only got to know her in her old age as the MATSAS, as seen here. I do remember her carrying out a tow in in absolutely the classic manner - no agreeing LOF through a coast station - the Lloyds Open Form was signed by her Master, slid into a French letter, attached to the heaving line that carried the tow line messenger and signed by the casualty's Master and passed back the same way.
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Triang made a small model of Turmoil, it sat well nicely to HMS Vanguard
 
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