Commercial fishing is the most dangerous job in America, and the law treats the people who do it accordingly. If you crew a fishing vessel and you are hurt, your rights are almost certainly far broader than a land-based worker’s, but only if you understand the status that unlocks them. In short: Almost all commercial…
If you were hurt working overseas for a U.S. government contractor, the first thing to know is that a federal law almost certainly covers you, no matter your job title or your nationality. The Defense Base Act is the workers’ compensation system built for civilians who support U.S. operations abroad, and its protections are broader…
Offshore wind is one of the fastest-growing industries in U.S. waters, and the law governing injuries to its workers is still taking shape. If you were hurt building, servicing, or transporting components for a wind farm, the single most important question is whether you count as the crew of a vessel or a worker on…
If you load ships, repair vessels, or work on a dock or in a shipyard and you get hurt, one threshold question decides almost everything about your recovery: are you covered by federal law or by your state’s workers’ compensation system? For most maritime workers who are not seamen, the federal answer is the better…
When a maritime worker dies far out at sea, a single line on a chart, three nautical miles from shore, can decide which law governs the family’s claim and how much their loss is worth under it. Few rules in maritime law have such uneven consequences. In short: The Death on the High Seas Act…
Losing a family member to a maritime accident is devastating, and the legal questions that follow can feel overwhelming at the worst possible time. One of the first is also one of the most practical: who in the family is actually allowed to bring a claim? In short: A maritime wrongful death claim is filed…
If you crew a cruise ship and get hurt on the job, you may be told your contract sends you to arbitration in another country under another nation’s law. That is often true. It does not mean you have no rights. In short: Injured cruise ship crew keep real maritime rights, including maintenance and cure…
When an oil rig accident happens, the company that signs your paychecks is rarely the only party at fault, and sometimes it is not the one you can recover the most from. Offshore operations run on a web of operators, contractors, and equipment makers, and figuring out which of them is liable is the difference…
The decisions you make in the first three days after an offshore injury can shape your health, your benefits, and the entire strength of your claim. While you focus on getting treatment, your employer’s insurer is already building its file. In short: If you are injured offshore, do six things fast: get medical care, report…
If you are searching for the average Jones Act settlement, you have probably found numbers that disagree wildly, from a few hundred thousand dollars to eight figures. Both can be true, and that is exactly why an “average” is the wrong number to anchor to. What follows is the real reported data, by injury type,…
