Oaksmith

This is an appeal from an interlocutory decree of fault entered in admiralty by Division Number One of the United States District Court for the Territory of Alaska.

The decision in the court below resulted from libel and cross-libel demands m rem and in personam and fo.r monetary relief by respective litigants and arose out of collisions involving two machinery-propelled fishing vessels, the Kiska and the Mayflower, which occurred on the 24th day of July, 1948, during darkness, with visibility good for seeing lights, in the channel of South Kaigani Harbor on the easterly side of Dali Island in southeast Alaska.

By stipulation of all parties filed in the District Court the trial therein was limited solely to the question of liability, leaving the question of damages by settlement or adjudication after entry of an interlocutory decree of fault.

Certain nautical deficiencies and faults of the Kiska at the time of the collision and prior thereto are admitted in this appeal, and the question presented here in the light of the record as a whole, is whether the trial court erred in finding that the Kiska was solely at fault. In other words, appellants relying upon the rule of The…