Key Bridge litigation: Shipowners settle with MD’s insurance company

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The insurance company that paid out $350 million to the state of Maryland for damages to the Francis Scott Key Bridge has settled with the striking ship’s owner and manager, attorneys said at a Thursday hearing.

The terms of the settlement are “strictly confidential,” Lawrence F. Walker, attorney for ACE American Insurance Company, said after the Thursday hearing in Baltimore.

The insurance company, a subsidiary of Chubb Ltd., had paid the state the limit on its claim for damage to Baltimore’s Key bridge, as the claim “was so large and so grossly exceeded” the maximum of the state’s policy, he said in court.

“As this matter remains subject to ongoing legal proceedings, we are not in a position to comment beyond what is already on the public record,” said Vishal Srivastava, head of media and communications for Synergy Marine Group, the manager of the Dali cargo ship that hit the bridge on March 26, 2024.

“Any discussions or arrangements between parties, where applicable, are confidential in nature, and we will not be commenting on details, including amounts,” Srivastava said.

The settlement was revealed during a status hearing at U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, where District Judge James K. Bredar discussed various expectations in the lead-up to the shipowners’ first liability trial scheduled to begin in less than two months.

“It will proceed on June 1,” Bredar insisted to the dozens of attorneys in the courtroom. “There should be no doubt on anyone’s mind.”

The trial is scheduled to take place over the course of 18 days. The petitioners — Synergy and Dali owner Grace Ocean Private Ltd. — will be seeking to prove that an 1851 admiralty law limits their liability for the allision to just $43.6 million, the value of the Dali and its pending freight. If they are unsuccessful, the shipowners could be on the hook for billions more in damages.

Bredar stressed that the parties should continue ongoing settlement talks over the next two months. Attorneys representing Maryland and those with wrongful death or personal injury claims have been engaging in “substantive” settlement discussions with the shipowners, according to a status report filed Friday.

The state, which has a claim that could total billions, engaged with the shipowners last week in a settlement conference mediated by Magistrate Judge J. Mark Coulson. Attorneys representing the estates of the six construction workers who died in the calamity, as well as two others who were injured, met with Coulson late last year.

The shipowners also settled in 2024 with the Department of Justice for the cost of the cleanup, about $102 million.

“My only message [on settlement talks] today is ‘full speed ahead,'” Bredar said at Thursday’s hearing.

Otherwise, the parties are due for a formal pretrial conference scheduled for early May.

The discovery phase, which included millions of documents and dozens of depositions, has concluded, besides an expert whose deposition is on hold due to “travel disruptions associated with the war in the Middle East,” according to the status report.

As far as the trial itself, Bredar said Thursday that he expects “a traditional trial” with live witnesses. Most of the fact witnesses with substantive testimony reside overseas, the parties wrote in their status report.

“I want them here, live and in person,” he said. “Spare me from the cold, written deposition transcript reading.”