Another major practice area of ZISTHLP is Shipping, Admiralty and Aviation. This includes both litigation and advisory work.

On the shipping side, apart from marine insurance, the Team handle issues including those in relation to general admiralty law and practice, maritime collisions, pollution, charterparty disputes, and salvage claims.

The Team handled a very substantial ship collision case involving the vessel “ICL VIKRAMAN”. This is believed to be one of the largest collisions claims in Malaysian legal history. The issues involved in the collision are extremely complex with related proceedings in England and France.

The Team have also dealt with major oil pollution cases such as that arising from the collision between “VOLVEX DELTA” and the “HIKARI II” and the case of the “STOLT ADVANCE” where the Firm represented numerous owners of fish farms, which suffered pollution damage as a result of the oil spill.

The Team have also been engaged as Counsel in ship explosion cases including a major case involving the vessel “LOTUS M”, a casualty which took place outside the port limits of Singapore.

In more recent times in Malaysia, the Team have also acted for and advised substantial clients in shipping and maritime law and practice. These include Petronas and its subsidiary, such as Kertih Port Sdn Bhd, Petronas Carigali, Petronas Penapisan, Malaysia International Shipping Corporation (MISC), Sabah Shell & Sarawak Shell.

ZISTHLP handled two major casualty cases involving damage to sub-sea pipelines caused by anchor drags in offshore operations. ZISTHLP acted for Shell and Newfield in these claims, both of which were successful (see the section “Oil and Gas” below).

The Team have also advised and acted in several aviation matters. The reported cases like Yusen Air are testimony to their experience in difficult air cargo claims, freight forwarders’ liability issues arising under International Conventions such as the Warsaw and Montreal Conventions.

The various areas of shipping, admiralty and aviation work include:

In undertaking shipping matters, ZISTHLP also had occasion to raise a constitutional issue before the Federal Court on an origination petition. This was in a case involving Wali Shipping. The constitutional issue was whether Counsel from the West Malaysian Bar was entitled to argue an appeal in the Court of Appeal in a case emanating from East Malaysia. This case also involved the former Attorney General (Gani Patail) who led the team from Chambers and also the Attorney General Chambers of Sabah & Sarawak as well as the respective Bars. The matter was eventually settled amicably after several rounds of hearing before a full bench of Federal Court Judges.