JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Eleven Jacksonville firefighters who were injured in the ship fire at JAXPORT in 2020 have reached a multimillion-dollar settlement with all four defendants involved in the lawsuit, an attorney with Pajcic & Pajcic announced Monday.
“Never in the history of admiralty law or American jurisprudence, until this case, could a ship owner be held responsible for their conduct when they hurt our first responders,” said Curry Pajcic, who represents the plaintiffs.
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Watch the full news conference in the video below
The 15-floor Hoegh Xiamen cargo ship caught fire on June 4, 2020 in the St. Johns River while at Blount Island.
Onboard were a deactivated fire system, and a crew that didn’t speak English, and about 2,400 used cars.
“A post-incident survey showed 70% of those cars did not have the batteries disconnected. Batteries that are not disconnected cause fires,” Pajcic said.
According to an investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board, the response from JFRD was delayed because the ship’s captain, who Pajcic said was Chinese, did not know how to a report a fire to the local authorities. Another hindrance to JFRD’s response was that the crew did not immediately reactivate the vessel’s fire detection system after the cargo was loaded.
“For an hour, the fire caught, went out of control, and became an inferno, thousands of degrees Fahrenheit,” Pajcic said.
While fighting the fire from the inside, at least 10 firefighters were injured when there was an explosion near the stairwell they were in. It took more than 150 firefighters over a week to put out the fire on the ship, an effort that cost the city millions of dollars. Despite their protective gear, the heat and flames caused severe burns on firefighters, snapping one rescuer’s arm. None of them died, but several were hospitalized, with some sent to the burn unit in Gainesville.
“These firemen had first, second, and third degree burns, snapped bones...wounds opened up,” he said. “It’s the internal injuries, the injuries you can’t see, the PTSD. That’s the worst...being trapped in a dark hold of a ship that looks like Armageddon and an explosion happening and thinking you’ll never see your child or wife again. Those are the worst injuries, and it never should have happened.”
Three months after the ship fire, 11 Jacksonville firefighters injured in a related blast sued for their injuries against the four companies involved: Hoegh Autoliners, Horizon Terminal Services, Grimaldi Deep Sea and SSA Marine.
“In America, you play by the rules. Now this case establishes you play by the rules, and if you don’t, you’ll be held accountable and responsible. They’re very simple rules. It’s a 10-cent cap on a battery, 10 cents to cap a pull of a battery so that no spark happens. So easy, turn on the fire alarm. It never gets out of control. These are easy things that were recklessly and negligently ignored, so play by the rules that we all share and keep us all safe,” Pajcic said.
The first defendants, Horizon, SSA and Grimaldi reached a settlement of $16 million collectively with these firefighters for the harm they caused, according to the attorney.
Hoegh Autoliners settled confidentially with the firefighters, Pajcic said.
“Hoegh is seen by these firefighters as the most culpable of all the defendants,” the attorney said. “They crewed and staffed the ship. The captain of the ship was their employee.”
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Firefighter Shawn O’Shell provided a brief statement on behalf of all the firefighters following the settlement announcement Monday.
“We are so grateful that this case has been resolved, and we’re thankful for the Pajcic & Pajcic for fighting this battle with us,” O’Shell said. “We are all still haunted by this terrifying day, and we hope that this result will spare other first responders from having to go through something like this.”
News4JAX reached out to the defendants in the case for comment but did not immediately hear back.
