Petitioner Exxons oil tanker, the Houston, ran aground and was lost several hours after its "breakout" from a mooring facility owned and operated, or manufactured, by the various respondents. Exxon filed a complaint in admiralty against respondents, alleging, inter alia, negligence and breach of warranty. In granting respondents motion to bifurcate the trial, the District Court limited the first phase thereof to the question whether the postbreakout conduct of the Houstons captain, Captain Coyne, was the superseding and sole proximate cause of the loss of the ship, leaving the issue of causation of the breakout itself for the second phase. After a bench trial, the court found that Captain Coynes (and by imputation, Exxons) extraordinary negligence was indeed the superseding and sole proximate cause of the Houstons grounding, and entered final judgment against Exxon. The Ninth Circuit affirmed. Among other things, it rejected Exxons legal argument that the doctrines of proximate causation and superseding cause are no longer