Catch me if you can!

I can, Interlegal team answers [speaking loudly Romanian].

One should not forget that we have offices in each Black Sea state; therefore, we are much more flexible and have more advantages in several types of cases, in particular, upon ship arrest.

What are we telling about?

A company – shipowner, member of the Turkish group of companies engaged in shipping worldwide – applied to Interlegal.

Since it surely states that Reni and Izmail sea ports are treated as Bosporus water area, the Shipowner applied to Interlegal due to maritime average in the form of barge collision (lately, it has been a typical case for us).

The vessel was berthed at the Izmail Commercial Sea Port, while the tugboat was towing a convoy of barges. Two barge lines got torn during their traffic along the Danube, so both barges drifted downstream and collided with the Client’s Vessel, having cased damage to hull. Vessel Master (and someone else, the author notes nervously) got worried…

As the result, our Client incurred significant losses; a well-reputed ship repair yard assessed loss amounting to 250,000 USD.

1^st attempt: failure

We successfully filed an Application on vessel detention to the Harbor Master.

We filed to the Vessel an Application on ship arrest – it was rejected.

In a nutshell, without highlighting reasons for rejection, we had a few minutes left. Unfortunately (oh no!) the Vessel left Izmail sea port water area; since at that moment we still were waiting for a court decision, we immediately cancelled the Application in order to preserve an option for ship arrest under such maritime claim in any other jurisdiction.

2^nd attempt: Romanian features

The Vessel freely called the Romanian port for the purpose of cargo discharge – that’s we expected!

Prompt, competent and professional actions of our Romanian colleagues facilitated vessel detention followed by successful ship arrest. Now the Parties are holding negotiations (o ha ha, the author notes).

Interlegal junior lawyer Dmytro Karetnikov, associate attorney Taras Dragan, Romanian partner Virgil Nita, managed by associated partner Karyna Gorovaya, leads the case.