Orient S. S. Co. v. Mitsubishi Shoji Kaisha, Ltd.

Based principally upon the alleged error of the court below in finding that the appellant’s motorship was unseaworthy and that due diligence had not been exercised in that regard, this is an appeal in an admiralty cargo damage suit from an interlocutory decree in favor of the libelant appellee.

The appellee was the purchaser and consignee of a shipment of ammophos fertilizer, part of which was damaged by sea water while on board the appellant’s motorship Lidien in transportation from New York to Japan.

There was no trial or oral argument in the lower court. The entire ease was submitted on the pleadings, briefs, and depositions, consisting of the testimony of ten fact witnesses and six expert witnesses for the appellant and four expert witnesses for the appellee. Because of this fact, we are hero called upon to consider the case de novo.

During a severe storm in the North Pacific Ocean, while the Indien’s decks were repeatedly swept by large waves, a brass screw cap came out of the top of a bilge sounding pipe 011 the after deck. Sea water ran down the pipe, overflowing the bilge and wetting a number of sacks of ammophos in No. 3' lower hold. The damage was caused when the sea…