This is the picture that emerges in a report by www.insurancebusiness.ca.
Allianz Global Corporate & Speciality of Lloyd’s unit Atrium, Malaysian Airlines’ insurer, has in the meantime, already paid out more than USD300 million in insurance compensation claims.
The insurance issue has arisen following several developments, according to the website.
Firstly, an Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) official has admitted for the first time that MH370 appears to have been under the control of Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah as it ended somewhere in the remoteness of the Indian Ocean.
ATSB Programme Director Peter Foley came to this conclusion last weekend. He disclosed that severe erosion along the trailing edge of two wing parts, which have since washed ashore, indicate a controlled landing.
Secondly, Australian authorities confirmed a Malaysian police report which mentioned Zaharie’s home flight simulator. It carried a plot deep into the southern Indian Ocean.
The evidence had been deleted.
Thirdly, investigations in Malaysia reportedly concluded the Boeing 777-200 serving MH370 crashed, killing all 239 people on board the ill-fated aircraft, after someone deliberately turned it south into the Indian Ocean.
Fourthly, someone aboard MH370 disabled the tracking devices on 8 March 2014 before it turned around at a point just short of Vietnam on that fateful day.
Fifthly, the aircraft used by MH370 had been operating since May 2002 without any mechanical or computer problems. Again, this means that someone aboard MH370 stopped the radio and transponder signals, which had been operating normally during the flight.
The admissions, according to the website, have virtually dismissed the theory so far that MH370 was an accident. This could prevent the families concerned getting any insurance compensation from the airline.
Spokeswoman Grace Nathan for Voice 370 , the MH370 next-of-kin group, admitted that families who settled for compensation from the airline may not be covered by insurance.
Those suing the airline, she said, may take criminal action as well. “You can’t start something now because the limitations date has passed,” she told The Australian. “If it’s proven to be pilot suicide, the insurance becomes void.”
Aviation policies, under sanction of the Montreal Convention, carry exclusions for suicide and terrorism. This is notwithstanding the question of Malaysian Airlines successfully determining the cause of the crash.
Nathan has also been mulling on the responsibility of an airline in a pilot suicide situation. Some families filed claims against the airline on the assumption that something other than negligence caused MH370 to go missing.