Hawaii Maritime Worker Injury Lawyer

Injured seamen are not entitled to workers’ compensation under federal or state law. However, they are entitled to three different types of compensation under federal law. 

1) Negligence: Seamen can sue their employers for negligence under the Jones Act. The Jones Act requires maritime employers to provide seaman with a reasonably safe work environment and maintain the vessel on which the seamen work and keep it in a reasonably safe condition. Any unsafe condition on a vessel, no matter the size of the vessel, can result in liability. Unlike civil tort law that governs most other types of personal injuries, the burden to prove an employer’s negligence is low under the Jones Act. Injured Seamen only need to show that the negligence of their employer played some part (even if very small) in their injury. Seamen are therefore entitled to compensation under the Jones Act even if the employer’s negligence contributed minimally to the incident that caused the injury. 

2) Compensation for the unseaworthiness of the vessel: A seaworthy vessel under maritime law is a vessel whose design, maintenance, and ability to perform its intended function are reasonable. A vessel is deemed to be unseaworthy if it did not provide the seaman with a reasonably safe environment for work or suitable appliances for the seaman to perform his duties in reasonable safety. Unseaworthiness isn’t about negligence. The owner of the vessel will be held liable even if they acted reasonably. The vessel would be considered unseaworthy if any part of it was deemed to be unfit for its intended function. 

3) Seamen are entitled to receive cure and maintenance and cure: Maritime law requires employers to provide seamen with maintenance and cure when they are injured while working aboard a vessel. This is required regardless of where the fault lies.  Maintenance may mean providing the injured seaman with room and board while they recover. It also means covering expenses such as their rent, property taxes, food, and utilities while they recover. However, expenses such as internet and phone are not covered.  Cure means covering the medical expenses of the injured seaman. The employer is required to provide both cure and maintenance until the injured seaman reaches maximum medical improvement. 

A seaman under maritime law is defined as a person that spends a significant amount of their time working on a vessel as a crewmember or captain. Maritime workers such as harbor workers that are not considered seamen aren’t covered by the Jones Act. They are instead covered by the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act. This federal law covers employees that work near or on water but are not seamen. These include harbor workers, people working in shipyards, and those that work on docks. 

Injured maritime workers eligible for compensation under the Longshore Act typically receive more in compensation than regular workers governed by the state’s workers compensation act. For example, state workers are entitled to 60% of their weekly wage under workers’ compensation. However, under the Longshore Act, maritime workers receive 66 2/3% of their weekly wage.