TRIPPED OVER A CHAIR ON A CRUISE SHIP

Yes, this is a real thing.  A repeat thing. Something known by the cruise lines. It sounds very simple. Chairs lined up for cruise passengers are mostly lounge chairs, the long ones that passengers can lay out on them.  The lounge chairs are put in place, in rows, by the workers on the cruise ship for use by the passengers. The problem is that when those chairs are placed around the walking track—the track that encircles the entire outer perimeter of the sun deck–then the cruise line’s lounge chairs extend over and onto the exercise track on certain cruise ships. This condition is especially true on the straightaway sections of the walking track where chairs are so close up to edge of the track and the chair backs of the chairs—for many of the chairs—are right against the exterior-most railing of the vessel. That means very little movement of a lounge chair by a guest—or bad placement of the chair by employees—puts the lounge chair right into the walking path.

And let’s be clear, this is a walking and exercise path, and not a stick-your-chair-out-into-the walking-path kind of path. This is a known situation with the cruise lines, who continue to place these elongated lounge chairs right up against the walking path. That means with very little movement the chair and/or chair legs stick out onto the walking path. Add in bright sunshine and it can be very difficult to see this hidden tripping hazard.

At our law firm, www.888BoatLaw.com, (the law offices of Frank D. Butler, PA) we have successfully handled numerous chair-tripping cases. They all share the same type of foundation: The chairs are close around the track. The chairs are placed too close to the track.  The chairs are moved by guests and end up onto the walking track. Employees of the cruise lines are not monitoring the area and keeping this known tripping hazard off the exercise track. What compounds this is, we don’t see a sign which informs guests to keep the lounge chairs off the exercise path. We don’t see employees telling passengers to move the chairs off the track.

These trip-over-chair cases cause serious injuries. In some of these cases the sudden unexpected catch of a person’s foot on a chair produces very violent fall-downs with little time to even brace for the impact against  the ship’s deck. Many of these fall-downs are suffered by older passengers whose reflexes do not allow for a defensive move, and that often means broken bones or other extensive injuries.

There are very few attorneys in the State of Florida who regularly handle maritime injury cases such as cruise ship injury cases. It is estimated that perhaps fewer 50 attorneys out of 107,000 handle cruise ship injury cases for injured passengers. It is important for your cruise ship injury case that you choose your lawyer carefully. At www.888BoatLaw.com (the Law Offices of Frank D. Butler, PA) we have successfully handled cruise ship injury cases for more than 25 years for our clients. You have the ability to go with experience, or you can choose a car accident attorney who has: 1. Likely never have handled a cruise ship injury case, and 2. They will just end up referring the case out to a true cruise ship injury attorney. Or they may just blow the statute of limitations on your case. (Caution: In most cases the statute of limitations is one year, but call us to talk about the specifics of your cruise ship injury case.) Choose wisely for your very important cruise line injury case. At www.888BoatLaw.com you can have confidence in our 25 years recovering for injured cruise ship accident victims.

CONTACT US NOW AT www.888BOATLAW.COM TO FIGHT FOR YOU.

FIGHTING CRUISE SHIP INJURY CASES THROUGHOUT ALL OF FLORIDA.