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Aviation insurance on a wing and a prayer
03 December 2009
It has been a year to forget for air travelers of a nervous disposition – not to mention aviation underwriters
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aviation
On January 16 2009, with the excesses of the New Year still warm in the memory, airline insurance underwriters were brought back to the harsh realities of their work with the news that an Airbus A320 had ditched in New York’s Hudson River.The good news was that airline pilot Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger had safely landed US Airlines Flight 1549 in the icy waters of Manhattan after the aircraft suffered a bird strike. All 155 passengers escaped serious injury thanks to the veteran pilot’s masterful emergency landing.Handing Captain Sullenberger the Lloyd’s Gold Medal for Saving Life – only the second person to receive the accolade in 173 years – Lloyd’s chairman Lord Levene spoke for the insurance market as a whole when he said: “It doesn’t bear thinking about… if the plane had landed 400 yards to the left or the right we would have been facing another 9/11.”The sense...
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