This was an appeal from the judgment of the Commercial Court of first instance (2 December 2015, 2014/1474-2015/463).

The plaintiff claimed that a ship owned by the defendants drifted out to sea and issued a distress signal as a result of machinery failure during its voyage. The plaintiff's ship rescued the defendants' ship with its crew members by towing it to the port where it could safely anchor. After the incident, the masters of the two ships entered into a salvage agreement in which the right to a salvage reward was reserved. The plaintiff further claimed that both parties chose the jurisdiction of the specialised Maritime Court in the salvage agreement, and in the marine accident report, the salvage and rescue operations were particularly mentioned. Therefore, the plaintiff claimed to be a salvor, entitled to reward in the sum of TRY 600,000, to be paid by the defendants jointly and severally, after a successful operation in respect of a ship exposed to danger.

The defendant claimed that the operation should be evaluated by the Court to determine whether it fell within art 1298.1 of the Turkish Commercial Code (the TCC) defining salvage operations [based on art 1.a of International Convention on Salvage 1989 - Türkiye became a party to the Convention in 2013, which provides that salvage operations mean 'any act or activity undertaken to assist a vessel or any other property in danger in navigable waters or in any other waters whatsoever'. The defendant also claimed that the salvage reward requested from the plaintiff should be evaluated by an expert appointed by the Court to determine the ship's actual appraised value, and whether such a reward amount was supposed to be requested from all the ownership interests of the rescued ship based on their liability proportion in shares.

The other defendant claimed that the Court of first instance did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case. Therefore, it requested the dismissal of the lawsuit in terms of governing jurisdiction.

The Court of first instance observed that art 1088 ff of the TCC do not provide that the master can enter into a jurisdiction agreement on behalf of the shipowner and disponent owner. Thus, the defendants cannot be bound by the jurisdiction clause. The Court found that the defendant's court of domicile has jurisdiction to hear the lawsuit under art 6 of the Turkish Civil Procedure Code. Therefore, the Court ordered the file to be transferred to the Civil Court of first instance.

The plaintiff appealed to the Supreme Court of Appeal.

Held:The appeal is admissible. The judgment of the first instance Court is reversed in favour of the plaintiff on the grounds below.

The Supreme Court of Appeal affirmed that the merits of the case are based on the request for salvage remuneration due to a successful salvage operation. The Supreme Court observed that the agreement dated 17 November 2014, which was issued jointly by the masters of the ships following the salvage operation, referred to salvage proceedings in the specialist Maritime Court jurisdiction.

The Supreme Court further found that masters are authorised to sign a salvage contract on behalf of the vessel owner pursuant to art 1300 of TCC [which is based on art 6.2 of the Salvage Convention 1989]. This authorisation also involves determining a court of competent jurisdiction and the conclusion of an arbitration agreement. With reference to this article, the jurisdiction agreement concluded by the master of the ship owned by the defendants was binding on them. As a consequence, the Court of first instance's judgment should be reversed in favour of the plaintiff.