Page:United States Reports 502 OCT. TERM 1991.pdf/242

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SOUTHWEST MARINE, INC. v. GIZONI Opinion of the Court

the vessels under repair. Once in place, the platforms support ship repairmen engaged in their work. Southwest Marine employed respondent Byron Gizoni as a rigging foreman. Gizoni worked on the floating platforms and rode them as they were towed into place. Gizoni occasionally served as a lookout and gave maneuvering signals to the tugboat operator when the platforms were moved. He also received lines passed to the platforms by the ships’ crews to secure the platforms to the vessels under repair. Gizoni suffered disabling leg and back injuries in a fall when his foot broke through a thin wooden sheet covering a hole in the deck of a platform being used to transport a rudder from the shipyard to a floating drydock. Gizoni submitted a claim for, and received, medical and compensation benefits from Southwest Marine pursuant to the LHWCA. He later sued Southwest Marine under the Jones Act in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California, alleging that he was a seaman injured as a result of his employer’s negligence. Gizoni also pleaded causes of action for unseaworthiness and for maintenance and cure. App. IV–4, IV–5. In addition to the above facts, Gizoni alleged in his complaint that Southwest Marine’s floating platforms were “a group of vessels. . . in navigable waters,” and that as a rigging foreman, he was “permanently assigned to said group of vessels.” Id., at IV–3. The District Court granted Southwest Marine’s motion for summary judgment on two grounds. The District Court determined as a matter of law that Gizoni was not a Jones Act seaman, finding that Southwest Marine’s floating platforms were not “vessels in navigation,” and that Gizoni was on board to perform work as a ship repairman, not to “aid in navigation.” App. to Pet. for Cert. I–1, I–2. More important to our purposes here, the District Court further concluded that Gizoni was a harbor worker precluded from bringing his action by the exclusive remedy provisions of the LHWCA, 33 U. S. C. § 905(a). App. to Pet. for Cert. I–2.