"Crewman of hijacked ship sues over safety" by Associated Press | April 28, 2009
HOUSTON - A member of the crew on the US-flagged ship hijacked by African pirates sued the owner and another company yesterday, accusing them of knowingly putting sailors in danger.
Richard E. Hicks alleges in the suit that owner Maersk Line Limited and Waterman Steamship Corp., which provided the crew, ignored requests to improve safety measures for vessels sailing along the Somali coast. Hicks was chief cook on the Maersk Alabama....
Hicks asked that the two companies improve safety for ships by providing armed security or allowing crew members to carry weapons, sending ships through safer routes, and placing such safety measures on ships as barbed wire that would prevent pirates from being able to board vessels. "We've had safety meetings every month for the last three years and made suggestions of what should be done and they have been ignored," Hicks said.
"We think [the companies] should be more concerned about the personnel on their ships than the profits the companies make," said Terry Bryant, Hicks's attorney.
Good luck on that last one.
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