Asbestos Maritime Claims (Jones Act)
Maritime workers faced asbestos exposure like few others. They didn't just work around asbestos, they lived in it. Engine rooms were packed with asbestos-insulated pipes and boilers. Sleeping quarters were lined with asbestos wallboard. Mess halls, corridors, and cargo holds were all built with materials designed to resist fire but destined to cause cancer.
For decades, seamen breathed that contaminated air without warning. Today, thousands of former merchant mariners, Navy veterans, and commercial sailors are living with mesothelioma, lung cancer, and asbestosis that trace back to their exposure on board the ships they served on.
The law gives them a way to fight back.
Under the Jones Act, maritime workers have the right to sue their employers for failing to provide a safe work environment. And unlike land-based workers limited by state workers' compensation systems, seamen can pursue full compensation in court—with no caps on damages and a lower burden of proof.
Why Ships Were Full of Asbestos
The widespread use of asbestos on ships began after tragedy. In 1934, the luxury liner SS Morro Castle caught fire off the coast of New Jersey, killing 137 passengers and crew. The flames spread rapidly through the ship's flammable interiors, and Congress took notice. By 1937, federal law required fireproof construction on all new passenger vessels.
Shipbuilders turned to asbestos. It resisted heat, insulated machinery, and wouldn't burn. Within years, asbestos was everywhere on American ships. Asbestos at sea was a solution to one disaster that would slowly create another.
Learn more about the Morro Castle fire.
Asbestos was used in nearly every part of a vessel:
Pipe insulation and boiler wrap
Gaskets and engine seals
Marinite panels for bulkheads and cabins
Fireproof flooring, adhesives, and wallboard
Wiring insulation and electrical panels
Soundproofing in staterooms and corridors
The material meant to save lives in emergencies would take thousands of lives through daily occupational exposure.
Learn more about products made with asbestos.
What Is the Jones Act?
The Jones Act is a federal law that gives maritime workers the right to sue their employers when unsafe working conditions cause injury or illness, including diseases caused by asbestos exposure.
Passed as part of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, the Jones Act was Congress's recognition that maritime work was uniquely dangerous. Before it existed, injured seamen had almost no legal protection. They were considered "wards of the admiralty," with no right to hold their employers accountable, even when employer negligence was obvious. The Jones Act changed that. It gave seamen the same basic rights land-based workers had fought for: the right to a safe workplace, and the right to compensation when that safety is violated.
The law covers workers on commercial cargo ships, oil tankers, Navy vessels, tugboats, barges, and company-owned vessels operated by refineries, chemical plants, and energy companies. If you served aboard a vessel in navigation, you may be protected.
The 30% Rule. To qualify under the Jones Act, you must have spent at least 30% of your working time aboard a vessel (or fleet of vessels) in navigation. Even if part of your job was on land, you may still qualify if a significant portion involved time aboard ships.
The key advantage over workers' compensation claims: the Jones Act allows seamen to pursue full compensation in court, with no state-imposed caps on damages and the right to a jury trial.
Key Protections of the Jones Act
The Right to Sue for Negligence. Under the Jones Act, you can sue your employer if their negligence contributed to your asbestos exposure. That includes failure to warn workers about known hazards, failure to provide respirators or protective equipment, failure to ventilate enclosed spaces like engine rooms, and failure to maintain safe working conditions aboard the vessel.
What makes the Jones Act powerful is the standard of proof. In most personal injury cases, you have to show that negligence was a substantial cause of your illness. Under the Jones Act, you only need to show that your employer's negligence played any role, no matter how small. Courts call this the "featherweight burden of proof." It exists because Congress recognized that maritime workers face hazards most people never encounter, and proving exactly how an illness developed decades later shouldn't be an impossible bar to justice.
Maintenance and Cure. Even if your employer did nothing wrong, they still owe you support under a doctrine called maintenance and cure. This is a no-fault obligation rooted in centuries of maritime tradition: if a sailor gets sick in service of the ship, the ship must care for him.
Cure covers all reasonable medical treatment until you reach maximum medical improvement. Maintenance covers basic living expenses (rent, food, utilities) while you're unable to work. For seamen diagnosed with asbestos-related disease, this protection can provide critical financial support during treatment, regardless of whether negligence can be proven.
Full Compensation Without State Caps. Because the Jones Act is federal law, it preempts state-imposed limits on damages. Many states cap pain and suffering awards or restrict wrongful death recoveries. Those caps don't apply to Jones Act claims. Maritime workers can pursue the full value of what was taken from them: medical expenses past and future, lost income and earning capacity, pain and suffering, diminished quality of life, and wrongful death damages for surviving family members.
Who Can File a Jones Act Claim?
To bring a claim under the Jones Act, you must meet two requirements: legal eligibility as a seaman and a medical diagnosis of an asbestos-related disease.
Seaman Status. The Jones Act only protects workers who qualify as seamen under federal maritime law. That means you contributed to the mission or function of a vessel, and you spent at least 30% of your working time aboard that vessel (or a fleet of vessels) in navigation. The vessel must be "in navigation": afloat, capable of moving, and not permanently moored or decommissioned.
This typically includes engine room workers, deckhands, electricians, merchant mariners, stewards, and crew members on tugboats, tankers, cargo ships, and barges. It generally excludes dockworkers, shipyard employees, and land-based support staff who work near ships but not aboard them.
Medical Eligibility. You must have a confirmed diagnosis of an asbestos-related illness: mesothelioma, lung cancer, asbestosis, or pleural disease.
Learn more about the diseases asbestos can cause.
What If You Don't Qualify? Workers who don't meet the seaman definition aren't without options. Dockworkers and shipyard employees may be covered under the Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act. Family members who developed illness through take-home exposure can't file under the Jones Act, but may have product liability claims or trust claims against the manufacturers of the asbestos products that came home on a seaman's clothing.
How Jones Act Claims Work with Other Claims
The Jones Act is powerful, but it's usually not your only option. Most maritime workers with asbestos-related illness have multiple claims, each targeting a different responsible party.
Jones Act claims target your employer—typically either the vessel owner or operator who failed to provide a safe working environment. You're suing them for negligence: the warnings they didn't give, the protective equipment they didn't provide, the hazards they knew about and ignored.
Product liability claims target the manufacturers who made the asbestos products aboard the ship. The company that owned the vessel didn't manufacture the pipe insulation, the gaskets, or the boiler wrap. The companies that did can be sued separately for failing to warn about the dangers of their products.
Trust claims come into play when those manufacturers have filed for bankruptcy. More than 60 asbestos companies have established trusts to compensate victims. If the company that made the insulation in your engine room is bankrupt, you file a trust claim instead of a lawsuit, often with faster processing times.
LHWCA or state workers' compensation may apply if you don't qualify as a seaman. Dockworkers, shipyard employees, and harbor workers have their own protections under the Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act.
These claims aren't mutually exclusive. A Jones Act seaman can sue the vessel owner for negligence, file product liability claims against solvent manufacturers, and submit trust claims against bankrupt ones—all simultaneously.
Learn more about how we build cases other firms can't.
What Jones Act Would Have Meant for Clarence Borel
Clarence Borel worked at the Texaco refinery in Port Arthur, Texas—a facility with active docks where vessels loaded and unloaded oil, chemicals, and industrial materials. Ships came and went constantly, many with asbestos insulation in their engine rooms, boiler spaces, and cargo areas.
Borel was a land-based insulator. His legal claims were product liability against the manufacturers of the insulation he handled, and—if his case were filed today—premises liability against Texaco for failing to warn or protect him.
For compensation from his direct employer, Borel was limited to workers' compensation. He filed a claim against Fuller-Austin's insurance carrier and settled for roughly $13,000—a fraction of his expenses and nothing for his pain and suffering.
Now imagine Borel had spent 30% of his time aboard those vessels at Texaco's docks, insulating pipes in engine rooms while ships were in navigation. That single distinction would have changed everything.
As a Jones Act seaman, he wouldn't have been limited to workers' comp. He could have sued the vessel owners directly for negligence under the featherweight burden of proof, been entitled to maintenance and cure regardless of fault, and faced no state caps limiting his recovery for pain and suffering, lost wages, or wrongful death damages for Thelma and his children.
His product liability claims and trust claims would have remained the same. A Jones Act claim would have been an additional avenue of recovery, not a replacement.
Read how we'd handle his full case today.
Take the First Step
Maritime asbestos claims have strict deadlines. The Jones Act has its own statute of limitations, and other claims (product liability, trust claims, wrongful death) each have their own filing windows that vary by state and circumstance. Once those deadlines pass, your right to compensation may be gone, no matter how strong your case.
"I know what it means to miss that window. I lost my father and two grandparents to asbestos-related cancers. By the time I became an attorney and understood what legal options should have been available, it was too late. The statute of limitations had run. I never got justice for my own family. I won't let that happen to yours." — Justinian Lane. Read my story.
If you or someone you love served aboard ships and later developed mesothelioma, lung cancer, or asbestosis, the time to act is now. When you contact us for a free consultation, we'll review your maritime work history, determine whether you qualify under the Jones Act, identify every vessel owner, manufacturer, and trust that may owe you compensation, and explain how all your claims fit together.
We handle Jones Act claims alongside product liability lawsuits, premises claims, and trust filings—coordinating everything to maximize your total recovery. You focus on your health and your family. We handle the rest.
The consultation is free. There's no obligation. You pay nothing unless we recover compensation for you.
Call 833-4-ASBESTOS (833-427-2378) or schedule your free consultation online.