Living With Your Plane

Q&A - Liability insurance

Question: We’re having a disagreement about liability insurance for our fly-in community. Some of our property owners want as high a liability policy as we can get. Another group says a minimum about is adequate and the third group says we shouldn’t have any liability insurance for the airpark; each homeowner should just carry his own.  What’s the best answer?

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Remember engine-out procedures

I’m not an expert on safety and don’t intend this note to imply such. However, local news reports have touched on an issue that I wanted to share.

Recently an aircraft departed from a public-use, privately-owned airport that includes a large fly-in community. Unfortunately, shortly after takeoff, reports indicated the engine quit and the pilot apparently attempted to turn 180 degrees and return to the runway. The plane was at somewhere between 100 and 300 feet in altitude, according to different reports.

Eyewitnesses were quoted as saying the airplane, a Thorp T-18 homebuilt, went inverted and dove into the ground, killing the pilot, striking a home and seriously damaging it. No one in the house or on the ground was injured.

In training we are all taught that in the event of an engine failure the best course of action is to fly straight ahead rather then attempting to turn back to the field.

I’ve never experienced an engine out on takeoff (and certainly hope I never do). However, many a time as I’ve prepared to take off from a short field in the Baron I flew for years, I would remind myself that in the event of an engine failure I would plan for a straight ahead landing. Would I have gone in straight ahead? Would I have attempted to turn back? I don't know the answers but I know what the statistics say about both courses of action.

It is hard to know what one will do in an emergency situation and each case is different as are the circumstances. The safety statistics clearly show that the best possible survival from an engine out on takeoff is not attempting a turn. Please keep this in mind next time you prepare for a flight.

Information about Airparks by state

This is the first in a planned series of stories describing state by state the airparks listed in the Living With Your Plane Directory. We’re starting with Alaska and will tackle one state per issue unless there is a particularly low number of airparks in that particular state. In that case, we’ll try to do several states in the same story.

As always, we welcome your comments and ideas and of course, if you have information about other residential airparks in Alaska or any other state, we urge you to go the website (http://www.livingwithyourplane.com)  and add any information you have by clicking on Register your Airpark.

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Questions & Answers on airpark living

Many of you interested in living on a residential airpark and even some of you who have already bought on a fly-in community have questions. These issues are extremely varied but all are important.

While not everyone is interested in every question raised all issues are of interest to some folks. As I speak at various functions around the country, I hear about the issues and try to answer them at the time.

Recently I started printing these questions in General Aviation News together with my response. I plan to provide these question and answer articles on this blog now as a means of spreading the information further. And, of course, I’m also hoping you will join in the general discussion from your personal perspective.
Here’s the first of the articles:

Question: One of our airpark property owners has his property for sale and the lookers aren’t particularly airplane people, from what I’ve learned. Is this going to be a problem and if so, what do we do about it?

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Got turf? - Study breaks ground on maintaining turf runway

By JANICE WOOD
General Aviation News

It happened at every meeting of the homeowners association Bill Tuccio attended.

A resident of Yellow River Airport, an airpark in Holt, Fla., Tuccio said that one question came up every time: What do other airports do to take care of their turf runways?

“A lot of time was wasted on these constant discussions,” said Tuccio, who participates in the maintenance of the airpark's 2,500-foot runway.  That's why he decided to conduct a Turf Airport Study as his graduate project for Embry Riddle Aeronautical University, as part of his work toward his Master's degree in Aeronautical Science.

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Longtime insurance agent comments on issue

Chuck Wenk, a second-generation aviation insurance broker, told us recently that liability coverage for residential airparks and individual homes is readily available from a wide variety of companies. How the property is managed becomes the major key in getting the coverage and the rate required.

Located in Highland Park, IL, Wenk said his company was started by his father and today includes his own offspring, thus making it a 3-generational insurance agency providing a full range of coverage. He claimed his firm, Wenk Aviation Insurance, is the oldest aviation insurance firm in the country. The firm is licensed to sell insurance in every state except Hawaii and Alaska, he added.

Most residential airparks are securing liability coverage of $1 million although he has written policies as high as $10 million. Wenk reported that there is no "average" figure for liability coverage. "Every situation is different," he explained. "Does the airpark sell fuel, is there a maintenance facility, are the homes fenced from the runway, can kids get to the airplanes, etc., are all questions that the insurance underwriter wants to have answered," Wenk added. He said the premium for the insurance coverage depends on the answers.

"We've written $1 million liability policies for as low as $850 and as high as $21,000," he stated.

You can reach Went Aviation Insurance at 1-800-225-WENK.

Property lines run through runway

I read your recent article in the April 4, 2008 Issue of General Aviation News regarding airpark liability insurance.
    Our airpark, High Mesa Airpark LLC has a 3300 foot long, 60 foot wide runway.  Each of the 20 lots of 2 acres owns  property out to the middle of the runway, with a setback of 150 feet where no construction is allowed.  Each lot owner makes his own taxiway to the runway.
    In your answer, “Hopefully the runway, taxiways or other common property are held by a homeowners association that is incorporated.”    The question is what is meant by the words, “held by”? 
    Also, in paragraph two, “consider the value of the property owned by the association.”  Our association does not own any of the runway itself.
    How could one distinguish between runway ownership and home ownership of for example lot 7,  and a common runway?
    The situation might also be complicated by our County Planning and Zoning regulations.
    In the event of an “incident” leading to litigation, most likely occurring on the runway, the situation becomes even more unclear.
    I concur with you in that I would not want to be part of an association that goes without liability insurance.
    Possible resolution of these questions might come from a study of other examples of past cases involving air park associations in litigations.
    Do you know of an attorney with experience involving air park associations? Please advise.

Thank you,

Ron Garver,  Maintenance Manager
Phil DiBartola, Air Park Assn. President

Insurance firms provide answers to airpark liability coverages

Recently we asked insurance firms to tell us about liability insurance terms and fees for residential airparks.

We received responses from Jon R. Shimer, Jr. of Aviation Insurance Resources and Norma Joyce of AUA.

The information they provided is below together with the contact information.

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Join me for LWYP forums at Sun 'n Fun

Planning a visit to Sun ‘n Fun at Lakeland, FL next week?

I’ll be participating in several forums on residential airparks during the week and I hope you’ll take the time to join me. When I’m not doing a forum, you’ll be able to locate me at the General Aviation News tent (E-33) and I’ll be happy to visit with you about your situations and answer your questions.

As in past years, Ray Sessions, developer of Cannon Creek Airpark, and I will be co-hosting the forums.

Our approach has always been to present a brief program on airparks and then invite anyone involved in an airpark development to speak briefly about their place and then we open it for questions and (hopefully) answers.

The first forum will be on Tuesday, April 8 at 9 am in Tent 5 of the forums area.
On Thursday, April 10, we’ll participate again at 9 am in Tent 8.
Finally, on Sunday at 10 am we’ll have a final opportunity to visit, again in Tent 8.

California paper publishes good story on airpark living

The San Francisco Chronicle recently published a good story about a couple of Cameron Airpark (California) residents and their lifestyle. To read the story, click here