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UNUSUAL
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Insurance Accounts
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One of Whitcomb Surplus Lines more unusual challenges was arranging the liability
and physical damage coverage on behalf of one of the nations largest oil company’s
in joint venture with a large manufacturer for a subsea oil well.
The unit was 50 feet high and outfitted to be a habitat sitting on the ocean floor.
A bathysphere-like device connected by cable to the top of the device and triggered
by signal was released to pick up maintenance crews on the surface at which point
the subsea unit would re-wind the cable, drawing the bathysphere and maintenance
crew down to the habitat. The unit was designed to operate at depths of up to 300
feet and avoids the usual problem an unsightly permanent platform presents as a
navigation hazard.
I also participated in the placement of the Course of Construction coverage of Kharg
Island Four in the Persian Gulf. This island connected by submerged pipelines 16
miles long to the mainland terminals and is used as an oil tanker loading facility.
Insurance placement problems included gathering Persian Gulf climatologically data
for the previous 99 years along with geological information regarding the ocean
floor and the island.
It’s a little difficult to separate the “unusual risks” from the “Large” and the
“Unusual” given the fact the premiums for the “unusual” tend to be large, but a
sampling of what I would assume would be characterized is more “Unusual” than large
and difficult are;
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- Animal Mortality coverage for Secretariat and Riva Ridge
- Crop Insurance for bananas in Samoa, Macadamia nuts in Hawaii
- Satellite launch coverage for India’s Palapa “B” launch
- Hull deductible buy-back for the Onassis Olympia Star Fleet
- Hull and liability for the Soviet submarine retrieval vessel “Gigante”
- Products liability insurance coverage for a Japanese-owned chain of blood donor
centers
- Liability and property insurance program for international system of rocket launch
and satellite monitoring
- Cast, liability and other coverage’s for major motion pictures and television productions
in the United States, Mexico and the South Pacific
- Products liability for race car chassis manufacturers
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