Shipbuilding giants face sky-high claims! Is the design flaw of the ship that caused the accident to blame?

Litigation continues to heat up around the worst bridge collapse accident in the United States in 44 years caused by the container ship "DALI" in March last year. Shipeast sued South Korea's HD Hyundai Heavy Industries, as the shipyard, in U.S. federal court, alleging that defects in its ship design were the "culprits" of the tragedy.

A few days ago, the owner of the "DALI" ship, Grace Ocean, and the operator, Synergy Marine, filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, alleging that "the marine switchboard manufactured and installed by HD Hyundai Heavy Industries had design defects, which led to power system failures and eventually caused the ship to collide with the bridge."

At present, HD Hyundai Heavy Industries is preparing to make a formal response to the product defect liability lawsuit filed by Grace Ocean and Synergy Marine, as well as the complaint filed by the U.S. government.

The complaint did not specify the potential amount of Grace Ocean and Synergy Marine's claims. Previously, Grace Ocean and Synergy Marine had agreed to pay the U.S. government $102 million (about 733 million yuan) for the reopening of the shipping lane connecting the Port of Baltimore to the Atlantic Ocean.

In their complaint, Grace Ocean and Synergy Marine stated that the component in question was an "Under Voltage Release (UVR) control circuit." The plaintiff alleges that one of the control signal wires of the control circuit was not securely mounted on the spring-loaded terminal block, which was caused by a design error in which the label strip was too close to the terminal, resulting in insufficient connection space. This design flaw caused the circuit to be "disconnected" and the voltage could not be transmitted to the UVR coils, which caused the entire ship to blackout, which eventually caused the "DALI" to crash into the bridge without propulsion and maneuverability.

The Plaintiffs' claims were also supported by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the U.S. Coast Guard's investigation into the accident.

In its interim investigation report released in June 2024, the NTSB stated, "There was a signal interruption in the control loop connected to the main circuit breaker, and poor cable connections were the cause of the power outage." The report also mentioned that HD Hyundai Heavy Industries technicians also admitted that "the state may indeed cause circuit disconnection" and that the problem has been reproduced in subsequent simulation experiments.

In addition, the "DALI" had repeated electrical system failures before the accident. According to the investigation, the day before the bridge collision, the "DALI" also had a power outage during its dock call. The NTSB believes that this recurring power system anomaly "poses a significant risk to the seaworthiness and safety of ships."

In response to the incident, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the shipowner and operator in September 2024, claiming $100 million. The U.S. Department of Justice stated in the complaint: "The defendants forcibly operated the vessel despite known defects and failed to truthfully report the relevant issues." ”

In addition, the Maryland government also filed a separate lawsuit for damages for the cost of cleaning and rebuilding the bridge after the collapse.

In this regard, Grace Ocean and Synergy Marine are trying to limit their liability through the "Limitation of Liability" strategy, and seek to transfer some of the responsibility to the U.S. government and shipbuilder HD Hyundai Heavy Industries.

This lawsuit is no longer a purely civil case, but raises serious issues related to technical liability and regulatory regulation for the global shipbuilding industry. As accidents are attributed to design flaws and electrical failures in specific components, the reliability of marine electronic systems and the manufacturer's responsibility for quality assurance will receive more attention.

In March last year, the "DALI" collided with the piers of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, about 2.6 kilometers long in Maryland, USA, causing the entire truss bridge to break and collapse in multiple places, triggering the worst bridge collapse in the United States in 44 years.

The accident killed six workers who were carrying out repair work on the bridge and paralyzed the port of Baltimore for a long time, causing huge economic and social losses.

It is understood that the Francis Scott Key Bridge is a steel-arched continuous truss bridge located in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, spanning the lower Patapsco River and the Port of Baltimore/Harbor, with the main road being Maryland Route 695. With a main span of 1,200 feet (366 meters), it is the third longest span of the world's continuous truss bridges and the longest bridge in the Baltimore metropolitan area.

The bridge opened on March 23, 1977 and is named after amateur poet Francis Scott Key, author of the American national anthem "The Stars and Stripes". The 8,636-foot (2,632-meter) bridge carries four lanes of Interstate 695 and passes through about 34,000 vehicles per day, with an estimated 11.5 million cars transported annually.

The "DALI" was built by HD Hyundai Heavy Industries and delivered in 2015. The ship has a total length of 299.94 meters, a width of 48.21 meters, a draft of 14.50 meters, a gross tonnage of 94,730 tons, and a container capacity of 9,962 TEU, owned by the Singaporean company Grace Ocean, and is leased to Maersk in the form of a time charter, hoisting the Singapore flag and classifying the Japanese Classification Society.

According to Clarkson, the main engine of the "DALI" is a MAN B&W 9S90ME-C9.2 two-stroke engine, and the auxiliary engine is from HD Hyundai Heavy Industries' Engine and Machinery Division (HHI-EMD). In addition, the design adopted by the ship is also the HHI 9200 TEU W-type design independently developed by HD Hyundai Heavy Industries.

It is worth mentioning that as early as July 2016, just one year after the delivery of the "DALI", the ship had an accident in the port of Antwerp, when the ship also crashed into the dock during the departure process. According to public data, an inspection of the ship in the port of Antwerp in 2016 found structural problems with "damage to the hull, affecting its seaworthiness."

The bridge collapse caused by the "DALI" caused great damage to shipping and road traffic in the Port of Baltimore. Bruce Carnegie-Brown, chairman of Lloyd's of London, pointed out in an interview with Reuters that the DALI bridge crash could result in billions of dollars in insurance claims, making it the largest single marine insurance loss in history.

Marcos Alvarez, managing director of global insurance ratings at Morningstar DBRS, said: "Depending on the length of the blockage and the nature of the Port of Baltimore business interruption insurance, the insurance loss caused by the accident may be between US$2 billion and US$4 billion (about 14.439 billion to 28.878 billion yuan), which will exceed the insurance loss record of about US$2 billion in the 2012 luxury cruise ship 'Costa Concorde' stranding. ”