Drillship Floorhand Hurt in the Moonpool: $16 Million Jones Act Settlement

A drillship's moonpool is the open well at the center of the vessel, the shaft through which drill pipe and heavy equipment pass down toward the seabed. It is one of the most hazardous places to stand on an offshore rig. A floorhand was working in that area aboard a drillship in the Gulf of Mexico when an incident involving equipment in the moonpool left him seriously injured.

A floorhand handles pipe, tools, and machinery on the drill floor, some of the most physically demanding labor in the offshore industry. This worker came away with serious injuries, the kind that can keep a man from ever returning to rig work.

Offshore work compounds an injury like this. Drillships operate in deep water far from port, crews rotate through long hitches, and medical help can be hours away by helicopter. An injury that might be manageable onshore becomes far more dangerous on a vessel.

Zehl & Associates, a Houston maritime and offshore injury firm, took the case under the Jones Act. That federal statute lets a seaman sue his employer for injuries caused by negligence and requires the employer to furnish a reasonably safe place to work. Firm founder Ryan Zehl prepared the matter for trial in Texas, building it around the conditions in the moonpool and the employer's failure to keep its crew safe.

"Offshore workers do some of the most physically demanding and dangerous work in the world," Ryan Zehl said. "When the companies they work for fail to give them a safe place to do that work, we hold them fully accountable."

The defense agreed to settle shortly before the case reached a jury. The figure was $16 million. TopVerdicts later recognized it as the largest reported Jones Act maritime settlement in Texas for 2025 and ranked it among the most significant legal recoveries in the state that year across every practice area.

Because the recovery came through a negotiated settlement rather than a jury verdict, there was no award to reduce on appeal and no remittitur. The $16 million was paid in full.