Offshore Injury Help
1. The short answer: two tests, both required
To be covered by the LHWCA you must pass the status test and the situs test. Status asks whether you are in maritime employment under 33 U.S.C. § 902(3). Situs asks whether you were injured on navigable waters or an adjoining maritime area under 33 U.S.C. § 903. Fail either one and the LHWCA does not apply.
When people research LHWCA coverage, they are usually trying to answer one practical question: does this federal law cover my injury, or am I limited to smaller state benefits? The answer turns on two requirements that Congress wrote into the statute. They are easy to state and surprisingly hard to apply, which is why so many longshore cases are fought over coverage before anyone even argues about the injury.
Think of it as a door with two locks. The status lock asks what you do: are you engaged in maritime employment such as loading ships, repairing them, or building them? The situs lock asks where you were hurt: did the injury happen on the water or on an adjoining pier, wharf, dry dock, or terminal? Both locks have to open. A welder who repairs ships clearly passes status, but if he is hurt at a shop miles inland he may fail situs. A clerk injured right on a working pier may pass situs but fail status.
Status is about your job. Situs is about your location. The LHWCA only covers you if both fit. That is the whole framework, and almost every coverage dispute is really an argument about one lock or the other.
Bottom line: The status and situs tests are two doors you both have to walk through. If you are unsure whether you pass them, that uncertainty is exactly what a maritime specialist resolves.
2. The two-part test and where it came from
Before 1972, the LHWCA covered injuries only on actual navigable waters. The 1972 amendments extended coverage landward onto adjoining maritime areas and added the status requirement, creating the modern two-part test of maritime employment plus maritime location.
The two-part structure is not an accident. It is the product of a famous gap in the old law. For decades, coverage stopped at the water's edge, a boundary the Supreme Court drew in Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen. A longshore worker could be covered while standing on a ship and uncovered a moment later while standing on the pier, doing the same job. Workers fell in and out of coverage as they crossed the gangway.
In 1972 Congress fixed that by moving the coverage line landward and, at the same time, adding a job-based filter so the newly expanded zone would not sweep in every shoreside worker. That is how status and situs came to work together: situs was widened to cover the docks, and status was added to keep coverage tied to genuinely maritime work. For background on the act itself, see our overview of what the LHWCA is.
33 U.S.C. § 902(3): Definition of "employee"
The term "employee" means any person engaged in maritime employment, including any longshoreman or other person engaged in longshoring operations, and any harbor worker including a ship repairman, shipbuilder, and ship breaker, but such term does not include certain listed workers if covered by state workers' compensation.
Bottom line: The two-part test exists because Congress widened the geographic reach of the LHWCA in 1972 and used the status requirement to keep that wider zone tied to maritime work.
3. The status test: maritime employment
The status test asks whether your work is "maritime employment." It is satisfied if your job is part of the process of loading, unloading, building, or repairing a vessel. You do not have to be touching cargo at the exact moment of injury; work that is an integral part of those operations counts.
Status is the "who" half of the LHWCA status and situs tests. Section 902(3) lists the clearest examples, longshoremen, ship repairers, shipbuilders, and ship breakers, but the phrase "any person engaged in maritime employment" is broader than the list. The Supreme Court has read it functionally: if your work is integral to moving cargo between ship and shore or to building and repairing vessels, you are in maritime employment even if your specific task is a step removed from the cargo itself.
Northeast Marine Terminal Co. v. Caputo
432 U.S. 249 (1977) · U.S. Supreme Court
The Court held that the 1972 amendments cover the entire loading and unloading process, not just the final lift on or off the ship. A worker engaged in any part of that process is in maritime employment, which ended the old idea that coverage turned on a single "point of rest."
That functional reading is why a worker who maintains the equipment used to load ships can pass status. In Chesapeake & Ohio Railway Co. v. Schwalb, the Supreme Court held that workers who keep loading machinery running are essential to maritime commerce and therefore engaged in maritime employment. The test is about the role your work plays, not the job title on your badge.
Bottom line: Status is satisfied when your work is an integral part of loading, unloading, building, or repairing vessels. Courts read it by function, not by title.
4. Who passes the status test
Longshore workers, stevedores, ship repairers, shipbuilders, ship breakers, harbor workers, and those who maintain or operate the equipment used to load and unload vessels generally pass the status test. So does almost anyone injured while actually working on the navigable water itself.
The core group is straightforward: the people who move cargo between ship and shore and the people who build, repair, and dismantle the ships themselves. Crane operators, dock checkers, lashers, ship cleaners, welders in a shipyard, and mechanics who service loading gear all tend to qualify because their work is part of maritime commerce.
There is also a powerful backstop for anyone hurt over the water. In Director, OWCP v. Perini North River Associates, the Supreme Court held that a worker injured on actual navigable waters in the course of employment is covered, because the 1972 amendments were meant to expand coverage, not strip it from workers who had it before. So if you were physically over the water when you were hurt, you usually satisfy status without a separate fight about your job description.
Director, OWCP v. Perini North River Associates
459 U.S. 297 (1983) · U.S. Supreme Court
A worker injured on actual navigable waters in the course of employment is a covered "employee," because Congress did not intend the 1972 amendments to withdraw coverage from workers who already had it. Being over the water at the moment of injury is, in itself, usually enough for status.
Bottom line: If you load or unload ships, build or repair them, or were injured directly over the water, you almost certainly clear the status half of the test.
5. Who the status test leaves out
Section 902(3) expressly excludes several groups when they are covered by state workers' comp, including purely clerical or data-processing staff, certain marina and recreational workers, restaurant and retail staff, suppliers and vendors temporarily on the premises, aquaculture workers, and people who build or repair recreational vessels under sixty-five feet.
The 1984 amendments added a list of workers who do not pass status, even on a maritime site, as long as they are covered by a state compensation law. The idea was to keep the LHWCA focused on genuinely maritime work and let state systems handle the rest. The excluded categories include office and clerical staff, club, camp, restaurant, museum, and retail workers, certain marina employees doing recreational work, vendors and suppliers passing through, aquaculture workers, and those who build or repair small recreational boats.
There is a hard limit on status that has nothing to do with the exclusion list, and it is worth knowing. In Herb's Welding, Inc. v. Gray, the Supreme Court held that a welder working on a fixed offshore oil platform in state waters was not in maritime employment, because a fixed platform is not a vessel and oil production is not traditional maritime work. It is a clean example of failing status even while working out over the water.
Herb's Welding, Inc. v. Gray
470 U.S. 414 (1985) · U.S. Supreme Court
A welder on a fixed offshore oil platform was not engaged in maritime employment for LHWCA purposes. Building and maintaining a platform that produces oil is not the loading, repairing, or building of vessels, so the status test was not met.
An employer or insurer may point to your job title to argue you are "excluded" or "just clerical." Titles do not control. What controls is what you actually do and whether it is part of maritime operations. Do not accept a denial based on a label alone.
Bottom line: Status has real limits. Purely clerical, recreational, and certain shoreside jobs are carved out, and not all over-the-water work counts. Your actual duties decide it.
