After prolonged silence on what it meant to be a seaman, the United States Supreme Court decided four seaman status cases in the 1990s. Three of them provided necessary clarification; one, Harbor Tug and Barge Co. v. Papai, provoked confusion over what it means to have an employment-related connection to a vessel that was substantial in nature, particularly when Justice Kennedy, who wrote the opinion for the Court said that the nature of a seaman’s work had to take them to sea. The confusion that statement caused has endured and deepened. This presentation is about that confusion and about the Fifth Circuit’s attempt to alleviate it in Sanchez v. Smart Fabricators of Texas, L.L.C.