The LHWA compensates injured maritime workers, mostly dock workers. The LHWA may be the most important workers’ compensation law you have never heard of. In 2023, cruise and cargo ship traffic hit record highs in Florida. Seven Florida ports counted 19.4 million cruise passengers that year, topping the previous record by more than 1 million people. That record was set in 2019, the last full year before the pandemic temporarily shut down the cruise industry. Port Tampa Bay reported more than 35 tons of total cargo coming through in 2023, making it the busiest cargo port in the state.
Higher volume usually means a higher likelihood of serious injury. A higher volume increases the chances of all Big Three injuries, which are outlined below. Together, these three injuries account for more than half of the fatal accidents in Florida ports.
When Congress passed the LHWA in 1927, the Grand Bargain between workers and management was in full swing. In the GB, management provided a no-fault injury compensation system in exchange for workers surrendering their right to sue in court. Now, some one hundred years later, the environment is different. The federal bureaucracy gets bigger every year. Claims that were once paid almost immediately now take months to resolve. Furthermore, the larger bureaucracy means injured victims need a Florida job injury lawyer more than ever before. On average, victims with lawyers get about five times the settlement money of victims without lawyers.
Common Dock Worker Injuries
More people and more cargo carriers at Florida docks are only part of the issue. To deal with the increased volume, especially the increased cargo volume, most ports now use extremely large cranes. Frequently, these cranes move large cargo carriers off ships and directly onto flatbed semi-trucks. This dangerous environment often causes:
- Falls: A fall from a loading/unloading crane is almost always fatal. Victims rarely survive if they fall more than four stories. Even if they do survive, they usually have permanent injuries, like lost range of motion in a broken shoulder. Slip-and-fall injuries are often lethal as well if the victim has a pre-existing condition.
- Motor Vehicle Crashes: As mentioned above, at busy cargo ports, large flatbed semi-trucks almost constantly come and go. These large vehicles have poor sight lines, increasing the possibility of a pedestrian injury. That is especially true if many people are constantly coming and going as well.
- Struck By: The old story that a penny dropped off the top of the Empire State Building is fatal to a pedestrian on the ground is largely a myth. However, the story contains a grain of truth. The penny probably picks up enough momentum to cause a concussion. Just imagine what a slightly larger dropped object, like a wrench or hammer, could do.
Harbor workers also develop occupational diseases, mostly repetitive stress injuries. These individuals stoop, reach, and kneel most of the day. These joints cannot take that level of wear and tear. Eventually, they give out.
Benefits Available
We mentioned the two kinds of LHWA benefits that are available above. Now, let’s break them down a little further and see what they mean to victims and their families.
Money-related stress usually causes PTSD-like symptoms. These symptoms significantly impede injury recovery. To alleviate these symptoms and give families a brighter financial future, the LHWA replaces two-thirds of the victim’s lost wages. The four categories of lost wage replacement benefits are:
- Temporary Total Disability: Most trauma injury victims cannot work as they recover from their injuries. So, they are entitled to lost wage replacement. However, the LHWA only replaces two-thirds of lost wages, mostly because the law assumes, correctly or incorrectly, that the victim was at least partially at fault for the injury.
- Temporary Partial Disability: As they recover, many victims can return to work part-time or take a light-duty assignment. As a result, they feel more productive and feel better about themselves. However, part-time or light-duty work does not pay as much as full-time regular employment. So, a Florida job injury lawyer can obtain two-thirds of the difference between the new and old incomes.
- Permanent Total Disability: Some trauma injuries are totally disabling. Some occupational diseases, like toxic exposure and cancer, are totally disabling as well. Basically, a “disability” means the victim cannot work again, largely for medical reasons but also for educational and vocational reasons.
- Permanent Partial Disability: PPD benefits are frequently available if the reduction to part-time or light-duty work is permanent. The LHWA also pays PPD benefits in amputation cases. In all permanent disability cases, the victim is entitled to two-thirds of all future lost wages.
The medical payment benefit usually applies to all reasonably necessary medical expenses, including costs like:
- Emergency transportation,
- Emergency care,
- Follow-up care,
- Prescription drugs and other ancillary medical costs, and
- Physical or occupational therapy.
Usually, injured dockworkers can choose their own doctors and change physicians at any time. It is also important to note that LHWA supplements but does not replace state workers’ compensation benefits. In other words, if workers’ comp is unavailable, for whatever reason, a Florida job injury lawyer normally files an LHWA claim.
The LHWA Process
A few final words about the claims process, which is often long and frustrating. Usually, a Claims Examiner evaluates the claim based on the medical records and little else. Because of the limited scope of this review, CEs nearly always deny injury claims, at least in part.
This denial does not mean your claim is weak and meritless and should be settled for whatever you can get. Instead, this denial is your ticket to the next level, which is an administrative law judge review.
The environment is much different at ALJ hearings. Much more evidence is available. Additionally, a Florida job injury lawyer can challenge the other side’s evidence and make legal arguments. So, much more compensation is available for victims who persevere to the end.
For more information about related job injury claims, contact Barnett, Lerner, Karsen, Frankel & Castro, P.A.