This was an appeal in cassation against the judgment of the Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal, 16 February 2011. CMA CGM, the charterer of the Jakarta, took on board containers containing shoes bound for Algiers (Algeria) at the port of Xiamen (China) under three bills of lading. A fire broke out at the vessel's stopover in Damietta (Egypt) which destroyed certain containers. Compagnie Algérienne des Assurances Transports (CAAT), subrogated into the rights of the cargo owner, sued CMA CGM for compensation. The Court of Appeal held that the maritime carrier was exempt from liability.

CAAT argued, among other things, that the carrier can only exonerate itself in the event of fire if the damage related to the fire is not caused by the act or the fault of the carrier. In this case, the trial Judges, referring to the expert's report, found that there was insufficient means available to the ship to fight the fire, as well as an absence of insurance cover for the crew to combat the fire, in the light of the dangerous nature of some of the products transported. In failing to investigate whether, because of these breaches, the damage, or the fire in so far as it caused the damage, were not attributable at least in part to the carrier, the trial Judges deprived their decision of a legal basis with regard to art 4.2 of the Hague-Visby Rules.

Held: Partial reversal.

It follows from the provisions of art 4.2.b of the Hague-Visby Rules, which apply to the relevant bills of lading, that the maritime carrier is not liable for loss or damage resulting from or arising from a fire unless it is caused by its act or fault. The Court of Appeal considered the hypothesis of a fire originating from the spontaneous or provoked combustion of a chemical product transported in other containers, but rejected it, in the light of the conclusions of the expert who, while noting the inadequacy of human and material resources to fight the fire on board the ship, which were not, however, the cause of the fire, indicated that the rules laid down by the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) for the packaging and transport of dangerous goods had been observed. The Court held that the cause of the fire could not be determined and, therefore, could not be imputed to the maritime carrier. By these findings and assessments, the Court of Appeal legally justified its decision.

However, in ruling inadmissible CAAT's application based on the third bill of lading, the judgment held that the three bills of lading were not all issued in the original, and that this bill of lading did not correspond to the invoice issued on 20 June 1999, and did not mention the buyer or the seller. By deciding thus, without specifying whether the bill of lading had been produced in copy or in original form, and whether it constituted a document of title of the goods establishing the rights of the cargo owner that were assigned to CAAT, the Court of Appeal did not give a legal basis for its decision. In that respect, the judgment is struck down and annulled and referred to the Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal, otherwise constituted, to be decided correctly.