Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

mdd.uscourts.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 202 posts

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

#111

Post by _heimdall »

unyttigfjelltol wrote: post #76
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.

This isn't an insurance lawsuit. Interestingly, it's also not exclusively a ship owner petition. The petition also includes the ship manager . Another poster linked to a USC section protecting the ship owner on the basis of them not knowing anything that caused the loss. So that is what it is. Ok, but why would a ship manager also be able to benefit from such a limitation ? The USC section doesn't say anything about…

Presumably the ship manager, and everyone else onboard, should only be liable if they did something wrong. If the vessel lost power and they followed all standard procedures, acting responsibly and simply couldn't avoid the collision, they did their jobs and shouldn't be financially or legally liable.

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

#112

Post by swores »

proteal wrote: post #83
swores wrote: post #22

TLDR of the logic behind that sum for anyone else who wondered like I did: They claim the ship's value before the crash as $90M, and that estimated costs for salvage and repairs to the ship are $19.5M and $28M respectively, leaving the value of the ship now at $42.5M (points 15-17 in the main document). They then add the value of pending freight ($1.17M): "Petitioners offer an Interim Stipulation of Value in the amou…

An answer like this would need to refer to the policy provisions to really know, but I'm willing to bet the ship should is valued at Replacement Cost. Replacement Cost varies depending on the term of the policy, but the goal of the definition is to get the policyholder back to where they were before the accident (technical term is to indemnify the casualty). This definition typically looks like this: "We will pay the…

You're talking about how to value the boat owner making an insurance claim (if their policy does indeed match your assumption), whereas I was talking about (and the court filing is about) a different equation which calculates what the current value of the boat is. But I'd also hazard a guess that their insurance policy does not cover this accident for some reason - because if they know their insurance policy is about to turn the boat back to its $90M value then surely this court filing claiming its new lower valuation estimates would be fraud?

Edit - actually the document does talk a bit about insurance on pages 10-11, but I don't think I understand it in the context of their claim lowering the value of the boat:

"NOW, THEREFORE, in consideration of the premises, Stipulator, The Britania Steam Ship Insurance Association Europe, an entity organized under the laws of England and Wales, hereby undertakes in the sum of $43,671,000, with interest at the rate of 6% per annum thereon from April 1, 2024, that if judgment is awarded against either or both Petitioners, such judgment may be entered against both Petitioner(s) and Stipulator for the amount not exceeding the aforesaid sum and interest.

Stipulator, The Britannia Steam Ship Insurance Association Europe, hereby submits itself to the jurisdiction of this Court in connection with this Stipulation and agrees to abide by all orders and decrees of the Court, intermediate or final, and to pay the amount awarded by the final judgment or decree rendered by this Court. If the final judgement or decree is appealed, Stipulator agrees to pay up to the principal amount of this undertaking, with interest at the rate of 6% per annum, unless Petitioner(s) pay such judgment or decree or, in the meantime, the amount or value of Owner's interest in the Vessel and its pending freight in connection with the voyage shall have been paid into Court by Petitioner(s) or a subsequent approved Stipulation for Value thereof shall have been given, in which case this Stipulation shall be void."

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

#113

Post by lotsofpulp »

RobotToaster wrote: post #107
lotsofpulp wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that disturbing? It takes far fewer hours of labor to deal with a death than to provide lifelong healthcare.

Because it creates a potential financial incentive to make sure they die.

The same incentive is there even if money did not exist. Providing services to someone (who is likely to be unable provide equivalent value in return) is more costly than not providing them. That is simply reality/math?

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

#114

Post by flakeoil »

dmurray wrote: post #105
Y_Y wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The odds did tighten up after Leicester won the Premier League though. You couldn't get 5000-1 on say Watford winning in 2016-17, the best odds IIRC were more like 500-1. It seemed like bookies really did adjust their expectations or their risk appetite for long-tail events in this market. And they were probably correct to do so.

Are those two events/teams comparable so that one could expect the same type of odds?

I'm not much into betting, but will not the odds change also based on how people are betting. So if many people started to bet on the unexpected result, due to for example that the unexpected Leicester team won last time, wouldn't odds tighten up automatically?

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

#116

Post by sokoloff »

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…

Chris Moneymaker* winning the 2003 World Series of Poker main event after winning his entry in an $86 online qualifying tournament (rather than paying the $10K entry fee from his own pocket) was the biggest thing that could have happened for poker.

* - Yes, that's really his name: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Moneymaker

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

#117

Post by keepamovin »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #108
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.

But there are a million times more “sedan” cars than boats, traveling a million more miles. An 18 and a 78 year old just killed two different sets of four people a couple weeks ago in SF and near Seattle. The 18 year old totaled his 3rd car in less than a year driving far above the speed limit. https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/san-francisco-medi... https://komonews.com/news/local/renton-deadly-multi-vehicle-…

That's a good point about relative frequencies, and it's the saddest of tragedies what occured in the stories you list. So tragic...

In the abstract, outside of the tragedy of these unfortunate events, it's true that there's more cars, however...think of it like, there's far more background radiation particles than neutron radiation particles. But the damage you can do with one, is far less than the other.

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

#118

Post by lotsofpulp »

swores wrote: post #51
keepamovin wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I completely believe this was just some mechanical Newtonian inadequacy that was accidental. However, I’ve never considered the possibility of sabotage, but now that you mention it holy fuck yes that must be a possible threat vector.

Other than hearing and dismissing a few people online suggesting this incident was an act of terrorism, I hadn't really thought further about it until your comment which made me go "oh... yeah, that does sound like it might be extremely feasible for a future attack, fuck."

A lot of a society’s “wealth” and “quality of life” is due to being able to trust others to act with some minimum level of integrity.

Otherwise, the society ends up looking like Somalia or Congo.

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

#119

Post by octodog »

dmurray wrote: post #105
Y_Y wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The odds did tighten up after Leicester won the Premier League though. You couldn't get 5000-1 on say Watford winning in 2016-17, the best odds IIRC were more like 500-1. It seemed like bookies really did adjust their expectations or their risk appetite for long-tail events in this market. And they were probably correct to do so.

Or, cynically, their original odds were right but they have taken the opportunity to reduce payouts because punters now consider that event more likely and thus would accept less.
Post reply on HN