Offshore Helicopter Crash Lawyers

Offshore Helicopter Law, in Plain English

Which law applies depends on who you are and where it happened

A crew member assigned to a vessel — including many workers riding to and from one — may qualify as a seaman under the Jones Act, 46 U.S.C. § 30104, which lets an injured seaman sue the employer for negligence and adds maritime remedies no Texas statute provides. A death beyond U.S. territorial waters may fall under the Death on the High Seas Act, 46 U.S.C. §§ 30301–30308, which defines who may recover and what. Platform workers who are not seamen have their own framework under federal law covering the outer continental shelf. None of these labels is automatic. Each is fought over, because each carries a different price tag.

The operator, the energy company, and the manufacturer

The helicopter operator flies under federal charter rules and owes the duties that come with them: qualified pilots, maintained aircraft, honest weather decisions. But the energy company that chartered the flight often controls the schedule and the pressure to fly, and the contract between them says who bears what. Add the manufacturer when a component failed, and an offshore helicopter case can have three or four defendants pointing at each other. Good. Their finger-pointing is our discovery plan.

How We Prove an Offshore Helicopter Case

The evidence is aviation evidence plus maritime evidence. Flight data and health-and-usage monitoring from the aircraft. The operator’s maintenance records, pilot training files, and weather-decision logs. The charter contract and dispatch traffic between the operator and the energy company, which show who pushed for the flight. The federal investigation record as it develops. And the personnel and assignment records that establish seaman status when the Jones Act is in play. We run the aviation case and the maritime case as one case, prepared for one jury.

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