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Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

mdd.uscourts.gov

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Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#91

Post by keepamovin »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #74
keepamovin wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but I think it would be quite the engineering challenge — or, ‘evil genius side quest’, whatever you wanna call it disturbingly — to cause $600 million worth of damage with a sedan car. Tho, YMMV, that’s just me.

If a broke drunk driver knocks a packed school bus off a cliff, that could easily be 600 million dollars worth of medical bills, if all the kids survive but become permanently disabled. And nearly all of it would have to be covered in the end by the taxpayer. No ‘side quest’ needed, just a few seconds worth of bad decision making.

Right, but conceivably rarer (thermodynamically, in terms of ratio of possible microstates/ensembles) than ships hittin bridges!

So, doesn't really compare. Yours is more of a hypothetical, mine's more of a reality. Haha! :)

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#92

Post by RobotToaster »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #74
keepamovin wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but I think it would be quite the engineering challenge — or, ‘evil genius side quest’, whatever you wanna call it disturbingly — to cause $600 million worth of damage with a sedan car. Tho, YMMV, that’s just me.

If a broke drunk driver knocks a packed school bus off a cliff, that could easily be 600 million dollars worth of medical bills, if all the kids survive but become permanently disabled. And nearly all of it would have to be covered in the end by the taxpayer. No ‘side quest’ needed, just a few seconds worth of bad decision making.

The more disturbing part is, it would be less expensive if they all died.

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#93

Post by blackbear_ »

SideQuark wrote: post #50
blackbear_ wrote: post #5

Privatize the profits and socialize the losses, here we go again.

The profits are also socialized, in that a huge chunk of US people are hurt financially when the bridge goes down, illustrating how most of us benefit from having stable flow of goods and services. If you (and millions of others) did not benefit from having this bridge, then you (and millions of others) would not now have lower quality of life when it fails.

I was obviously referring to the profits of the shipping company, made by cheaping out on maintenance, safety, etc...

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#94

Post by randall »

Y_Y wrote: post #86
AdamN wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that the insurers like these situations - it makes it obvious how important good insurance is and sales go up. The individual impact seems large to the layperson but is within the models of the insurance and reinsurance companies over time.

There is an analogous situation in (e.g. sports) betting. Every now and then someone places a really long bet on something like Leicester winning the Premiership and then gets a collosal payout. Inevitably there's some naive speculation that the betting shop will be very unhappy with this. In reality theae u likely events happen relatively infrequently (often disproportionately to even their long odds) and the public…

So big payouts become an organic marketing expense. Clever!

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#95

Post by jnsaff2 »

bilekas wrote: post #52

This is actually a really interesting case. Hear me out, a little bit of devil's advocate maybe.. If insurance company is forced to repay the whole cost of the rebuild, estimated it will cost lets say $600M. Tax payer is happy they're not paying via Federal taxes. But, shipping and logistics insurance companies start to ramp up their premiums and those fees are passed on to, eventually, the consumer over the long ter…

You just eliminated the whole point of insurance.

If every time the government is going to pay, then the obvious next step would be to get rid of insurance altogether ant everything would be cheaper yet.

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#96

Post by bluelightning2k »

Y_Y wrote: post #86
AdamN wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that the insurers like these situations - it makes it obvious how important good insurance is and sales go up. The individual impact seems large to the layperson but is within the models of the insurance and reinsurance companies over time.

There is an analogous situation in (e.g. sports) betting. Every now and then someone places a really long bet on something like Leicester winning the Premiership and then gets a collosal payout. Inevitably there's some naive speculation that the betting shop will be very unhappy with this. In reality theae u likely events happen relatively infrequently (often disproportionately to even their long odds) and the public…

Problem with this: an individual betting shop pays out, the sales lift is shared among the entire industry.

Concentrated downside, distributed upside. I doubt the individual bookie is happy.

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#97

Post by lotsofpulp »

proteal wrote: post #56
nashashmi wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. Base damage is covered by the first line insurer. The excess damage is covered by the backend insurer. Business is about managing loss. Nothing more. No further emotional support required.

What you are describing is true, but there is a lot of nuance to how reinsurance plays out in large insurance policy towers. If you build a stack of insurance policies that work together to create a large single policy limit, you typically won't see reinsurance directly in that tower. If "Westchester Insurance Company" is anywhere on that tower as a carrier (whether first line, known more commonly as a primary insure…

> It truly is insurance policies all the way down.

The way it has always played out in my lifetime, it is just a few levels of insurance, and then future taxpayers. See Katrina, Sandy, 2008 financial crisis, 2020 pandemic, etc.

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#98

Post by rob74 »

cientifico wrote: post #65
proteal wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a former property insurance broker whose clients had big claims ($100Mish) and worked around people who handled the real big claims ($1B+), I can't really tell you with any specificity of how this will play out. All I know is that it will be a huge mess, and the lawyers will argue in court for several years. Ultimately, someone will have to pay to rebuild the bridge. In the event of really big claims, it almost al…

I can tell you how is going to play out. The people with less money for lawyers will be held liable. Normally the captain.

Oh, I thought you meant the taxpayers (ok, they won't be held liable, but are still the most likely to pay for it in the end)

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#99

Post by algo_trader »

proteal wrote: post #23
altacc wrote: post #2

I have wondered what the insurance structure for this is and how liable the vessel's owners and insurers are for damage to public infrastructure. Marine insurance is one of the oldest types of insurance and antique in some respects, with large vessels covered by several underwriting firms. So potentially this is a massive financial hit for multiple companies if there is not a limit on liability.

As a former property insurance broker whose clients had big claims ($100Mish) and worked around people who handled the real big claims ($1B+), I can't really tell you with any specificity of how this will play out. All I know is that it will be a huge mess, and the lawyers will argue in court for several years. Ultimately, someone will have to pay to rebuild the bridge. In the event of really big claims, it almost al…

[flagged]

Re: Dali owner file petition to cap liability in Baltimore bridge collapse at $43.7M

#100

Post by Filligree »

ftrobro wrote: post #89
dagw wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

outlandishly expensive infrastructure projects are in the US As someone in Europe I wonder where this notion comes from. Just about every major (and several minor) infrastructure project I can remember in my lifetime, in any of the European cities I've live in, has been both late and wildly over budget

This train tunnel below Malmö in Sweden was finished in 2010 six months earlier than planned and at a cost 10% below budget. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_Tunnel_(Malm%C3%B6)

That’s Scandinavia though.
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