GROSS CARELESSNESS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 April 1942, Page 3

GROSS CARELESSNESS

CAUSE OF NORMANDIE FIRE AMERICAN COURT PLACES RESPONSIBILITY. PROCEEDINGS ADVISED AGAINST COMPANY. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, April 20. The Navy Department announced that a Court of Inquiry had placed the full responsibility for the big fire on the liner Normandie on February 9 on employees of the Robins Dry Dock and Repair Company. The court said the direct and sole cause of the fire was gross carelessness and utter violation of the rules of common sense by the company’s workmen. The court recommended proceedings against the Robins Company for damages to the full extent of the liability. A Washington message reports that at the Normandie Court of Inquiry it was stated that the contract covering the conversion of the Normandie limits the Robins Company’s liability to 100,000 dollars.

The Secretary of the Navy, Colonel Frank Knox, issued a supplementary report in which he branded two officers assigned to protect the Normandie as guilty of carelessness. However, he declared that, because of mitigating circumstances, the officers would not be court-martialled. They are Lieutenant-Commander Early Brooks, of the Coastguard, and Lieutenant-Commander Lester C. Scott, of the Naval Reserve. Colonel Knox also appointed a committee of marine experts to recommend further steps in the efforts to salvage the Normandie.