2002

Home > Journals > Around Alone Preparations

Ocean Planet Report
Eight days to go!!!!
Sept 07, 2002

Trouble, big time! After a frantic worldwide search by many insurance brokers on behalf of the race organization and the competitors, the only policy that has been found for the required $3,000,000 liability insurance has a premium of nearly $17,000!! This is for each of the six boats still needing the coverage. We are one of those boat!

The race rules require that each yacht carries the $3M liability insurance irregardless of whether or not they have “Hull” insurance on the boats themselves.

Insurance for the boats (in my case, Ocean Planet) have not been found at all except through IMOCA “sponsor” (ha!) MMA of France who offers “Hull” coverage with a premium of 17% of the boat value. This means the premium for Ocean Planet would be around $170,000 for the race!!

This is a dicey situation for me and the other five boats that need to cough up the $17k for just the liability insurance only, as that amount seriously detracts from the budgets for supplies, sails, preparation, etc.

THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A LIABILITY CLAIM ARISING FROM ANY RACING ACCIDENT DURING THE 20 YEARS OF THE AROUND ALONE, yet due to the post 9-11 tightening of insurance underwriting, the relatively small marine coverage market has almost totally dried up.

I will do whatever I have to, to be on the starting line, but I really hate to borrow more money just to pay this extreme premium. If there was ever a time topitch in (I know, you’ve heard THIS before…) this is it. Or if you know anyonethat can knock some sense into some insurance underwriters, there are sixboats who will buy insurance from them if they can offer a reasonable deal. And insurance on the boats would be nice too!!!!

Oh, by the way, Ocean Planet is ALMOST ready to rock….

Working at it!
Bruce