Plane owner sues U.S. for $45 million over Afghanistan crash
The U.S. government owes $45 million in insurance for the loss of a Boeing 747 that crashed in April at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan, killing its American crew of seven, the plane’s owner says in a federal breach-of-contract suit.
29 Oct 2013
National Air Cargo Group’s suit, filed Oct. 1 in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, says the government must make good on the insurance policy the charter operator took out with the Federal Aviation Administration in 2012. The FAA allegedly denied the company’s insurance claim last June after deciding that its policy did not apply to the Bagram crash.
(Westlaw users: Click here for more stories from Westlaw Journal Government Contract.)
The dispute concerns insurance benefits allegedly owed on a Boeing 747 that crashed in Afghanistan, allegedly because equipment defects made it unable to carry the cargo load it was designed it to hold. Here, delegates of the 68th annual International Air Transport Association general meeting survey a model of a Boeing 747.
The crash occurred April 29, shortly after the 747 took off from Bagram Airfield.
According to a May 1 statement by National Air Cargo, the plane initially departed Camp Bastion, Britain’s largest military base in Afghanistan, as National Airlines Flight 102. National Airlines is a National Air Cargo subsidiary that sometimes transports U.S. and allied military cargo between bases.
After leaving Camp Bastion, the jet stopped at Bagram to refuel. The plane’s cargo, which allegedly consisted of British military equipment and vehicles, was secure for the first leg of its flight, and the aircraft took on no new freight at Bagram, according to the statement.
Soon after departing Bagram, the 747 crashed, allegedly because equipment defects made the plane unable to carry the cargo load Boeing designed it to hold.
The Taliban, the radical Islamist group that has led the 12-year-old insurgency against U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan, initially took credit for the crash, according to widespread media reports.
But investigators quickly determined that the group’s claims were false, according to the same reports, which note that the Taliban often exaggerates or fabricates its own role in dealing setbacks to the American-led war effort.
The estate representatives of two of the pilots who died in the crash have also filed suit, accusing Boeing of installing a dangerously inadequate cargo-restraint system while converting the 747 into a freighter for National Airlines. Brokaw v. Boeing Co., No. 2013-L-009650, 2013 WL 4548341, complaint filed (Ill. Cir. Ct., Cook County Aug. 28, 2013); Virdi v. Boeing Co., No. 2013-L-009652, 2013 WL 4548342, complaint filed (Ill. Cir. Ct., Cook County Aug. 28, 2013).
(Click here for the complaint on Westlaw.)
National Air Cargo’s breach-of-contract suit against the federal government seeks $45 million to cover the value of the lost aircraft, as well as costs associated with wreckage recovery and site cleanup.
