Offshore Injury Help
1. Why DOHSA limits damages to pecuniary loss
DOHSA limits damages to pecuniary loss because the statute Congress wrote in 1920 says recovery is fair compensation for the pecuniary loss sustained by the surviving family. Pecuniary means financial. Courts have consistently held that when Congress has spoken directly to the question of damages, judges cannot add categories Congress left out.
Families are usually stunned by this. Someone died because a vessel was unseaworthy or an offshore crew was rushed, and the law responds by asking what the household lost in dollars. That answer feels wrong, but it is not an accident or an oversight by the lawyer explaining it. It is the plain text of the Death on the High Seas Act, which was passed at a time when wrongful death statutes were understood as replacing lost financial support rather than compensating a family's grief. If you are new to this law, our overview of how wrongful death at sea is compensated under federal law covers how a DOHSA claim works from the beginning.
46 U.S.C. § 30303, Amount and apportionment of recovery
The recovery in an action under this chapter shall be a fair compensation for the pecuniary loss sustained by the individuals for whose benefit the action is brought.
Two words carry the whole rule. Pecuniary narrows recovery to money, and sustained ties it to the people the statute names: the decedent's spouse, parent, child, or dependent relative. Everything a maritime wrongful death case fights about downstream, from earnings projections to which law governs, traces back to that single sentence.
Bottom line: The limit comes straight from the statute. Congress authorized fair compensation for pecuniary loss in 1920, and courts have declined to expand what Congress deliberately kept narrow.
2. What pecuniary loss actually covers
Pecuniary loss is the measurable financial value the family lost: the support the worker would have provided, the household services the family must now replace, the pecuniary value of a parent's nurture and guidance to a child, and funeral expenses paid by a beneficiary.
The category is narrower than most people expect and broader than the word money suggests. It is not limited to a paycheck. Courts look at what the household actually would have received had the person lived, projected across a working life and reduced to present value. That is why these cases turn on records and expert testimony rather than on how deeply a family is hurting.
- Lost financial support, meaning the share of wages, overtime, and bonuses the worker would have contributed to the household
- Lost benefits, including employer health coverage, pension or retirement contributions, and other fringe benefits with a dollar value
- Lost household services, the repairs, childcare, and daily work the family now pays for or does without
- Nurture and guidance, the pecuniary value of the training and instruction a parent would have provided a minor child
- Funeral and burial costs, where a beneficiary actually paid them
Each item has to be documented. Pay stubs, tax returns, union and benefit statements, work-life expectancy tables, and an economist's report do the work that emotion cannot. Our companion guide on what damages are recoverable under DOHSA breaks down each category in more detail.
Two families can lose the same person and recover very different amounts, because DOHSA measures documented financial contribution. Steady earnings, benefits, and years of work ahead build value. Missing records shrink it, which is why preserving pay and benefit documents early matters so much.
Bottom line: Pecuniary loss covers support, benefits, household services, a parent's guidance to a child, and funeral costs paid by a beneficiary, each proven with records rather than testimony about grief.
3. What families cannot recover
Under DOHSA a family cannot recover for grief, mental anguish, loss of society, companionship, or consortium, and generally cannot recover punitive damages. DOHSA also provides no survival claim for the pain the person suffered before death.
This is the part of the law that families find hardest, and it deserves to be said plainly rather than buried. The statute is silent on non-pecuniary loss, and courts have treated that silence as a decision rather than a gap. The exclusions below are not a judgment about what the loss is worth to a family. They are the boundary Congress drew.
- Grief and mental anguish suffered by the spouse, parents, or children
- Loss of society and companionship, the relationship itself, which many state wrongful death laws do compensate
- Loss of consortium, the marital relationship a surviving spouse lost
- Punitive damages, even where the conduct that caused the death was egregious
- Pre-death pain and suffering, which DOHSA does not provide, though a Jones Act survival claim may reach it when the person who died was a seaman
Who may bring the claim is set just as tightly. DOHSA identifies the beneficiaries as the decedent's spouse, parent, child, or dependent relative, and our guide on who can file a DOHSA claim explains how that list works in practice, including who is left out.
Whether these exclusions apply depends on where the death happened and the worker's legal status. A death inside state waters, on a fixed platform, or covered by another federal law can be governed by rules that allow broader damages. Confirm which law applies before accepting that grief and companionship are off the table.
Bottom line: Grief, loss of society, consortium, punitive damages, and pre-death pain and suffering fall outside DOHSA. The exclusions describe the statute, not the value of the person who died.
4. Why the three-mile line decides so much
DOHSA governs deaths caused by wrongful act, neglect, or default occurring beyond three nautical miles from the shore of the United States. Inside that line, state wrongful death law or general maritime law may apply, and those can allow damages DOHSA forbids.
Geography is not a technicality in these cases; it is the whole framework. The same accident, with the same cause and the same family, can produce very different recoveries depending on which side of the line the vessel was on. That is why the first questions a maritime attorney asks are where the death occurred, what the vessel was doing, and what the worker's legal status was. Fixed platforms add another layer, because a death on a platform attached to the seabed is often analyzed under a different federal framework that borrows the adjacent state's law, a point our guide on who is liable for an offshore oil rig accident works through.
- Beyond three nautical miles: DOHSA governs, and recovery is limited to pecuniary loss
- Inside three nautical miles: state wrongful death law or general maritime law may govern, sometimes allowing loss of society
- On a fixed platform: a different federal framework may apply and may adopt adjacent state law
- Seaman status: a Jones Act claim may run alongside the DOHSA claim and reach damages DOHSA does not
Because the categories overlap in real accidents, the first job is identifying which body of law your family's situation falls under. Our breakdown of maritime case types shows how the systems divide, and an attorney can confirm where a specific death sits before anyone talks about value.
Bottom line: Three nautical miles is the switch. Beyond it DOHSA and its pecuniary limit control; inside it, other law may apply and may allow the damages DOHSA excludes.
