Right before Christmas isn't a good time to talk about
this subject, but I'm afraid that if I wait, I'll have a case of
CRS. After several comments observed on the LML, I decided
to talk to my insurance broker and see what AIG would be requiring at
renewal. Seems that mosf the comments were on target, AIG wants a
complete inspection of the aircraft by either Joe Bartels or Tim Ong. We
are all aware that neither of these gentlemen are familiar with the many
variations of the builders, especially electrical and avionics. I
can see the process causing more problems than they fix with chasing down
broken wires and the like.
I asked my broker to see what AIG was
going to require at my April renewal and received the following in
response:
…,
AIG is requiring that all of the Lancairs they now
write have a new inspection. Under XXX’s policy, and as your’s probably
would be on renewal in April, AIG
states that an aircraft inspection by Joe Bartels or Tim Ong must be completed
and the certificate received by AIG
before renewal next year. In XXX’s case he would have had to have this
done by November 15, 2009. They have paid out $10,000,000 in claims and
have only collected $3,000,000 in premium. After this inspection is
completed it will then need to be reinspected every 3 – 5 years. It
sounds as to all of their claims are coming from pilot error. However, if they
are going to continue writing the business they feel they need to put on this
additional requirement. A pilot’s hours really has nothing to do with
this particular requirement at this particular time. A pilot needs
to have the initial training, 6 month recurrent training, and then annual
thereafter.
My broker was asked to talk to Global as several
people said they got insurance through them. The following was the
answer received:
( I spoke with Global’s manager
this morning.
They are not writing any policies
for any Lancair IV model, except for some that they have had on the books for
years He said the loss experience has been unbelievable and he made the
decision back in 2003 not to write any more of them. Apparently
AIG has had all the losses.
He is very surprised that they are
willing to continue to write them. He anticipates that the market will
completely dry up and sometime in the future no one will write them at
all.
I spoke with
AIG again . They provide the insurance for the
manufacturer so it would put them in a difficult position if they were to
decline to provide insurance for the individual owners.
After reviewing the NTSB report,
it appears as though the majority of the accidents are pilot error. The
aircraft inspection makes no sense to me, but I guess they had to put on some
requirement and that was it.)
This seems to imply that we are going to have another
bottleneck that will be difficult to break. To indicate that only two
people are able to certify the flight worthiness of our aircraft puts both the
owners and the company in dire straights. One, who in their right minds
would buy a Lancair kit with this hanging over their head? Two, the
requirement for reinspection at whatever interval is onerous and
expensive. Three, what is the value of the completed and flying fleet?
And Four, the requirement for training seems appropriate to address the issues
that the accident data reflects. How many of those payouts came from
pilots they insured without the HPAT training? Is the company at fault
for issuing coverage without assuring the training? What exactly are
they trying to fix with this very time consuming and expensive requirement?
Looks like a real problem is on the very near
horizon. Thoughts and comments appreciated.
Pat Brunner
LNC4 /P
780 Hours