Employees of oil refineries often face many hazardous conditions due to the nature of their work. Employees should seek an oil refinery explosion attorney’s advice to help guide them through the potentially complicated process of recovering from their employer or another negligent party. With the aid of an attorney, injured parties may be able to recover awards for damages like medical expenses. Wages lost due to the injury and other forms of compensation.
After being injured in an oil refinery explosion, the injured employee should seek medical treatment. Employees should also receive treatment and ensure the doctor records, in detail, the injuries and surrounding circumstances for future reference. This information may likely be valuable to the refinery explosion attorney representing the case.
The Jones Act
The Jones Act creates negligence or wrongful death action in favor of the personal representative of a seaman killed in the course of employment. The Act provides a remedy against a seaman’s employer when he is injured or killed through the employer’s negligence. The Jones Act does not distinguish between deaths in state territorial waters versus those occurring on the high seas.
This would require showing an employee’s status as a seaman and establishing the employer’s negligence. To be considered a seaman:
(1) An employee’s duties must contribute to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment of its mission [and] (2) A seaman must have a connection to a vessel in navigation (or to an identifiable group of such vessels) that is substantial in…both its duration and its nature. The Fifth Circuit’s rule of thumb is that a maritime worker who spends less than 30% of his time working on a vessel does not qualify as a Jones Act seaman.
After establishing the employee’s status as a seaman, the injured employee must show the employer was negligent. According to the Federal Bar Association, the Jones Act has a “relaxed,” “featherweight,” or “slightest” causation standard under which a seafarer only needs to prove that an employer’s negligence played any role, “no matter how small,” in causing the seafarer’s injury.
If the employee spent more than 30% of his time working on a vessel and shows some evidence that the employer’s negligence played some role in causing the injuries, then the employee may recover under the Jones Act.
Contact our Oil Refinery Explosion Lawyers at Zehl & Associate for a Free Consultation
If you or a loved one has been seriously injured in an oil refinery explosion accident, our oil refinery explosion lawyers at Zehl & Associates can help. Please contact us for a free, confidential consultation to discuss your legal refineries before jeopardizing a corporation, employer, or insurance company.