DATE: Thursday, October 2, 1997             TAG: 9710020492

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B5   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MARC DAVIS, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH                    LENGTH:   42 lines

BEACH WILL PAY OWNER OF BOAT THAT HIT BOTTOM IN RUDEE INLET

The city will pay $10,000 to the owner of a charter boat that ran aground in Rudee Inlet last year. The case was scheduled for trial this week.

This is the second Rudee Inlet case this year that Virginia Beach has settled out of court. In March, the city paid $55,000 to a boat owner who ran aground in 1995.

And in two weeks, the biggest Rudee Inlet case of all is scheduled for trial: a $1.5 million yacht ran aground on its maiden voyage in February 1996. So far, there are no settlement negotiations.

The latest settlement comes in the case of Atlantic Dive Charter, which operates a diving boat out of Rudee Inlet. The boat, the Virginia Mae, ran aground in shallow water Nov. 30, 1996.

The boat's captain, David W. Turner, claimed the city was negligent for not keeping the channel dredged and for not warning boaters that in some spots the inlet was as shallow as 3.8 feet.

The boat needed $5,200 worth of repairs. The company lost about six months of business until the inlet was open to safe navigation in May 1997, according to court papers.

The dive company sued the city and three city officials - City Manager James Spore, Public Works Director Ralph Smith and Coastal Engineer Phillip Roehrs - in February in Norfolk's federal court. The lawsuit sought $100,000 in compensation and $500,000 in punitive damages.

The two sides agreed to a settlement Monday, the day before trial.

The company's case against the city was hurt last month when a federal judge ruled in another Rudee Inlet case - the million-dollar yacht suit - that the city was not liable for punitive damages.

While that ruling applied only to the yacht case, the same reasoning probably would have held true for the Atlantic Dive case.

Now attention turns to the yacht case, scheduled for trial Oct. 15. It is expected to be the biggest test yet of the city's policy of maintaining, or not maintaining, the dangerous inlet. The yacht's owner seeks $1.5 million in damages.

A judge's ruling is pending in that case, which may be dismissed. The key issue will be whether the city gave adequate notice to boaters that Rudee Inlet had filled with sand to less than 4 feet in depth.

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