Marine Money Webinar Series - Ep. 14: Fail To Prepare, Prepare To Fail

In this webinar, Mr. Chris Grieveson (Managing Partner, Wikborg Rein) and Mr. Alex Hookway (Senior Lawyer, Wikborg Rein) review the legal principles and, perhaps even more importantly, the practical steps which should be kept in mind when establishing whether a vessel is seaworthy or not.
In review of the CMA CGM LIBRA decision ([2020] EWCA Civ 293), the Court of Appeal recently endorsed the first-instance Admiralty Court decision that a failure to properly prepare a passage plan and/or to properly mark-up navigational charts to reflect navigational dangers, may amount to a failure to exercise due diligence to make a vessel seaworthy, leading to an actionable fault defense for cargo interests who had refused to contribute to General Average.
The subject of seaworthiness has become even more relevant since the shipowner has recently been granted leave to appeal the decision to the UK Supreme Court. The appeal will revisit the legal test for unseaworthiness, the nature and limits of the carrier’s non-delegable obligation to exercise due diligence, and the consequences of a defective passage plan. The appeal is likely to take place towards the end of 2021, and the speakers will also comment about the likely outcome of such appeal.
Speaker Bios:
Chris Grieveson, Managing Partner, Wikborg Rein
Chris Grieveson is the Managing Partner at Wikborg Rein’s London office and is head of our Disputes Team, with decades of experience in shipping, oil & gas and commodity trading law. In shipping his work spans both traditional dry and wet shipping as well as contentious S&P. In the offshore industry his work is both advisory and related to operational and other disputes. Historically Chris has also acted in many shipping and offshore fraud cases (especially involving China, Russia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Africa) often successfully pursuing asset-tracing and recovery actions for clients.
Alex Hookway, Senior Lawyer, Wikborg Rein
Alex Hookway is a Senior Lawyer at Wikborg Rein’s London office and is part of the Firm’s Shipping Offshore Team. Alex has a broad range of contentious experience from the more traditional dry and wet shipping diet through to live casualty attendance, crisis management experience and more latterly disputes involving specialist offshore construction and service vessels such as FPSO’s, drilling rigs, OSVs, DSVs and heavy-lift assets as well drafting and litigating the underlying EPC/EPCI/T & I contracts which underpin the projects. Alex has been involved in some of the more recent high-profile marine and offshore casualties including Transocean Winner, Charlotte Maersk, MSC Flamina and MOL Comfort amongst others.