Passenger sues pilot for £100,000 payout

[fly_tornado]

Telford microlight crash victim thankful for £100,000 payout

 

By Tom Oakley | Telford | News | Published: 20 hours ago

 

A passenger who is lucky to be alive after a microlight fell 200 feet to the ground has spoken out after he was awarded almost £100,000 in compensation for the serious injuries he suffered.

 

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The aircraft after the crash. Photo: West Midlands Ambulance Service

 

A High Court judge ordered that Michael Foreman receive just short of £99,500 from the pilot following the crash which happened when a microlight aircraft they were in crashed.

 

The 55-year-old, from Telford, was a passenger in the aircraft when the incident unfolded in July 2015 at Shifnal Airfield.

 

He suffered several spinal fractures, a fractured chest bone and a number of broken bones in his feet. He had to pulled clear of the wreckage after a small fire broke out.

 

Now, Mr Foreman has said he is thankful the matter has been settled – allowing him to continue to make progress on overcoming his injuries.

 

“Little did I know that what was meant to be a fun day ended in such terrible circumstances,” he said.

 

“I’m still living with the consequences of what happened that day; I have trouble sleeping and suffer from severe back pain. Even things that people take for granted such as putting on a pair of socks can be a struggle.

 

“I used to really enjoy walking before the crash but now I even struggle to walk short distances.

 

“I’m thankful that the court has settled this matter, allowing me to concentrate on making further progress to overcome my injuries.”

 

Following the crash the 55-year-old instructed injury lawyers at Irwin Mitchell to help secure funds to help boost his recovery.

 

Angela Batchelor, specialist serious injury lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, representing Michael, said after the case: “Michael was fortunate to survive the crash in which he suffered a number of very serious injuries.

 

“The injuries Michael suffered in the collision have had a great impact on his day to day life. Although he is making good progress in his recovery Michael has a long way to go to try and overcome his injuries.

 

“We are pleased that the Court has recognised this and we hope that the funds awarded will provide Michael with renewed focus to continue his recovery.”

 

Mr Foreman was awarded £42,500 for his “pain, suffering and loss of amenity” and other sums to compensate him for care and travel costs and lost earnings.

 

His total payout came to £99,449 and Mr Williams was ordered to pay the legal costs of the case.

 

 

[Downunder]

What would be the case in Aus? RAA insurance would pay out?

 

Could the pilot still be sued....

 

 

[Happyflyer]

I would have thought insurance would cover the Pax to some degree. Hard to know what happened in this case, did the pilot contribute to the crash? Aust courts have said flying is inherently dangerous and are reluctant to award against the pilot.

 

 

[winsor68]

Comment deleted...(A little sympathy for the injured wouldn't hurt, appreciate the joke but a little out of place...Mod)

 

 

[Jaba-who]

What would be the case in Aus? RAA insurance would pay out?Could the pilot still be sued....

It’s a complex question or rather a complex answer.

You would hope that it will all go smoothly. The insurer will pay out and everyone will move on with their lives. And it probably will.

 

But not always -

 

Anybody can sue over anything that goes wrong. Being sued is a harrowing experience and plenty of times people just pay up rather than continue a fight even when they are not in the wrong. Some people get target fixation and want their day in court even if there is little chance of winning and the defendant can be found innocent but still end up being punished by the process.

 

There is nothing to stop a plaintiff accepting an insurance payout but claiming the payout limit is not enough and seeking a bigger top up from the defendant.

 

Also nothing to stop the insurance company trying at squirming their way out of paying. Usually they look for negligence on the part of the defendant which may negate the insurance companies liability.

 

Also nothing to stop a claim and then even if found in the pilots favour and costs awarded against the plaintiff. Then the plaintiff claims bankruptcy and the innocent defendant still ends up covering their own costs.

 

All can be very messy.

 

I don’t take anyone flying any more except family after legal advice from a magistrate friend. Not that it bothers me as I don’t Particularly want the responsibility of other people’s lives when I’m not at work.

 

 

[Jaba-who]

I would have thought insurance would cover the Pax to some degree. Hard to know what happened in this case, did the pilot contribute to the crash? Aust courts have said flying is inherently dangerous and are reluctant to award against the pilot.

It would be interesting to read the actual court transcripts or at least a legal persons summary. I suspect that the courts must have considered some degree of negligence on the part of the Pilot was present.

 

I would have thought they would also take the “inherently dangerous” line too. But if the pilot was negligent then that somewhat negates the inherent danger bit.

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

There's quite a bit of discussion about it here: Personal injury - FLYER Forums (@:mods - feel free to delete if you feel that forum competes with this one - I don't think it does).

 

The shareoplane I was involved with included third party liability to about £10m from memory (for each 3rd party - there was a max and restrictions, buit would have covered this). Aviation insurance companies here will generally pay out, even if there is some minor breach of the policy - the market is tight and as soon as word gets out that an insurer is unreasonable in handling claims, it is sunk.

 

What interested me was that, although for normal claims of tort, this would probably fail (someone claimed unfair contract terms act can't remove liability for personal injury - may be true - but if so, is a relatively recent change as when I studied law here, UCTA only protected liability for death), some posts claim that an accident is strict liability (i.e. it only has to have happened (unless various conditions apply) and one is liable). [snipped my interpretation, which after looking up strict liability, was not quite right - though I don't recall it in Tort (yet I still passed it)]

 

It would appear from the above, that in Aus, it would fall under the law of general tort or similar, in which case, it would come down to whether or not the pilot was negligent in their flying or emergency handling under the circumstances.

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Whilst I knew the pilot in the abovementioned accident, I do not know if he was fully / appropriately insured for passenger Injury liability.

 

Our Flying site management insist on every user presenting their documents on an annual basis for inspection. This means ALL documents pertaining to the aircraft and the pilot(s) of any machine based at the site. These are all logged and tracked. I don't have the latest update on the insurance requirement, but last year it was quite a comprehensive requirement, but there are dedicated companies in the UK who deal specifically with leisure aviation and their premiums and payout record are, to be fair, pretty good. They do not seem to believe that flying is 'Inherently Dangerous'

 

The reason that the management do this is that they are the last line of attack for law suits, being ultimately responsible for the safety of all activities on the site, including visitor safety.

 

This seems to work, although there was a lot of whingeing and crying when the new management took over Seven years ago and announced their plans. . . as it was the Wild West before this and no one knew who was insured or even legal. One Gentleman was suspended from the site in late summer 2017 for a period of six months for allowing his Permit to fly to expire by a few days, and yet was still flying passengers. This alone would have invalidated any insurance claim. He was very lucky not to have been permanently banned.

 

 

[turboplanner]

It's not really a practical comparison to look at an overseas situation.

 

Our laws are relatively simple; the plaintiff has to prove the defendant had a duty of care to prevent a reasonably foreseeable risk, and breached that duty of care

 

If you're a person who isn't reckless enough to be charged with culpable negligence, and your insurance cover is enough to cover the type of accident which you're likely to be involved in (e.g. flying solo from a farm up to flying in controlled airspace where you can take out a QLink etc. then you don't have a lot to worry about.

 

There's no difference taking up family members or strangers.The point of the legislation is to look after the person who has been injured or the family of the person who had been killed, and plenty of family members sue, particularly if they will need millions of dollars worth of medical assistance over a period of years.

 

 

[Seehowetofly]

I’m sorry I just don’t understand this. A guy who WILLINGLY steps into an ultralight should know there is a chance things could go wrong, unless said person is retarded to the point of not knowing an injury could occur. Unless the pilot pointed the aircraft at the ground and purposely injured this guy in my opinion he deserves zero. This is the kind of thing that makes everybody pay to much for insurance.

 

 

[turboplanner]

I’m sorry I just don’t understand this. A guy who WILLINGLY steps into an ultralight should know there is a chance things could go wrong, unless said person is retarded to the point of not knowing an injury could occur. Unless the pilot pointed the aircraft at the ground and purposely injured this guy in my opinion he deserves zero. This is the kind of thing that makes everybody pay to much for insurance.

I'll give you an example:

You know nothing about flying, except for the odd interstate or international flight, which you consider about as safe a taking a train.

 

Your wife buys you a surprise birthday present; a fight in an ultralight.

 

On your birthday she takes you out to this cute little airfield in the middle of a dense forest.

 

The sign says "Flying School", and there are a few people around, so you relax with a cup of coffee in the club BBQ area before your flight.

 

You have to sign a disclaimer; but you think "Everyone does, nothing to worry about"

 

Your Instructor comes over, gets you strapped into the aircraft taxys out to the strip and you take off.

 

Just after take off the engine cuts out; you realise there is nowhere in the area to land; it's all forest.

 

Some hours later you find yourself in a hospital you can't move; you're a quadriplegic age 32, with a life expectancy of 87.

 

Who is going to pay for the 55 years of live in nurse, rebuilding the house to suit which adds up to a total cost of around 48 million.

 

Someone advises you to go to a PL lawyer. He does his research, comes backl and says "With the airstrip surrounded by forest there was a forseeable risk, that any forced landing would result in serious injury or fatality. The Flying school operator breached his duty of care to prevent that risk. Your life costs are covered.

 

 

[Seehowetofly]

Sadly you’re example is exactly what the world has become. A society of victims with no personal responsibility. Any reasonable person should completely understand any activity they are about to undertake and not live in a world of its not my fault, especially if they sign a wavier. Maybe I just expect to much of society.

 

 

[farri]

I`ve probably taken more people flying than anyone else, here in Australia, I`m still prepared to do so and I`m fully aware of the consequences; I take it as a privilege that those I take flying are prepared to put their lives` in my hands.

 

Before we go flying, I brief everyone on the fact that the aircraft is an Ultralight aircraft, it is a real aircraft and things can and do something go wrong; I finish briefing by adding, that all I can guarantee is that I will give them the best of my ability, if they can`t accept that ( from memory, only 2 did not ) I won`t take them; For anyone under 18 years of age, I want their parents permission (always granted), therefore, those I take up have made an informed concious decision to fly with me; In the past, things have gone wrong! I`ve had several engine failures but never so much as scratched myself or someone with me and I have never even had the slightest hint of a lawsuit...Could it happen???

 

I`m old school, I believe in personal responsibility, I also believe that we are not creating a better society if we all hide under a rock (figure of speech) because we might be sued: All those I take flying come to me, I don`t go looking for them and as far as I`m concerned, we need to go back to personal responsibility, lawsuits, mostly make the Lawers rich!

 

By the way! I was at the first meeting, where we discussed if we were prepared to pay a bit more for A.U.F.now RA-Aus membership fees to have insurance for all members...We voted YES! Initially it was only third party insurance.

 

Frank......... A.U.F/RA-Aus member, 993.

 

 

[turboplanner]

I`ve probably taken more people flying than anyone else, here in Australia, I`m still prepared to do so and I`m fully aware of the consequences; I take it as a privilege that those I take flying are prepared to put their lives` in my hands.Before we go flying, I brief everyone on the fact that the aircraft is an Ultralight aircraft, it is a real aircraft and things can and do something go wrong; I finish briefing by adding, that all I can guarantee is that I will give them the best of my ability, if they can`t accept that ( from memory, only 2 did not ) I won`t take them; For anyone under 18 years of age, I want their parents permission (always granted), therefore, those I take up have made an informed concious decision to fly with me; In the past, things have gone wrong! I`ve had several engine failures but never so much as scratched myself or someone with me and I have never even had the slightest hint of a lawsuit...Could it happen???

 

I`m old school, I believe in personal responsibility, I also believe that we are not creating a better society if we all hide under a rock (figure of speech) because we might be sued: All those I take flying come to me, I don`t go looking for them and as far as I`m concerned, we need to go back to personal responsibility, lawsuits, mostly make the Lawers rich!

 

By the way! I was at the first meeting, where we discussed if we were prepared to pay a bit more for A.U.F.now RA-Aus membership fees to have insurance for all members...We voted YES! Initially it was only third party insurance.

 

Frank......... A.U.F/RA-Aus member, 993.

Yes, it's as easy as that!

 

 

[turboplanner]

Sadly you’re example is exactly what the world has become. A society of victims with no personal responsibility. Any reasonable person should completely understand any activity they are about to undertake and not live in a world of its not my fault, especially if they sign a wavier. Maybe I just expect to much of society.

See Frank's post; insure yourself and move on; the law in Australia hasn't changed since 1932, and is not about to.

 

 

[Jaba-who]

It's not really a practical comparison to look at an overseas situation.Our laws are relatively simple; the plaintiff has to prove the defendant had a duty of care to prevent a reasonably foreseeable risk, and breached that duty of care

If you're a person who isn't reckless enough to be charged with culpable negligence, and your insurance cover is enough to cover the type of accident which you're likely to be involved in (e.g. flying solo from a farm up to flying in controlled airspace where you can take out a QLink etc. then you don't have a lot to worry about.

 

There's no difference taking up family members or strangers.The point of the legislation is to look after the person who has been injured or the family of the person who had been killed, and plenty of family members sue, particularly if they will need millions of dollars worth of medical assistance over a period of years.

The difference with taking only family is that - worst case scenario and the whole family perishes there is no estate left to sue my estate. And if they survive but need care then it comes out of my insurance and my estate to whom I would have been leaving it anyway.

 

Last thing I want is to have a prang and then have a passengers estate sue for psychological loss ( as did the families of the skydiver Cessna 206 a few years ago and I think they won) or passenger sue for future costs of care and then my family loses it all and my family is left destitute while a passenger or their family get my estate.

 

Something else that most people are not aware of is that when they step into an aircraft that is not fixed route advertised rpt then their own life insurance is almost always invalid. So that leaves the injured party or the family left behind reliant on seeing to have any money to cover medical costs, care etc etc.

 

The other thing pilots should be aware is that if a passenger dies or loses their income then the estate can make claims based on loss of future earnings of that person. So if you take a doctor or a lawyer flying then have the prang the likelihood is that the claim for loss of future earnings will be huge. It may well be greater than your insurance payout even if the insurers payout without a quibble. If the payout falls short you or your estate has to make it up. If you don't have it they can garnishee your future income.

 

All very scary but that's the way it's become.

 

Sadly when an accident happens the victim will usually try to blame someone.

 

 

[turboplanner]

The difference with taking only family is that - worst case scenario and the whole family perishes there is no estate left to sue my estate. And if they survive but need care then it comes out of my insurance and my estate to whom I would have been leaving it anyway.Last thing I want is to have a prang and then have a passengers estate sue for psychological loss ( as did the families of the skydiver Cessna 206 a few years ago and I think they won) or passenger sue for future costs of care and then my family loses it all and my family is left destitute while a passenger or their family get my estate.

 

Something else that most people are not aware of is that when they step into an aircraft that is not fixed route advertised rpt then their own life insurance is almost always invalid. So that leaves the injured party or the family left behind reliant on seeing to have any money to cover medical costs, care etc etc.

 

The other thing pilots should be aware is that if a passenger dies or loses their income then the estate can make claims based on loss of future earnings of that person. So if you take a doctor or a lawyer flying then have the prang the likelihood is that the claim for loss of future earnings will be huge. It may well be greater than your insurance payout even if the insurers payout without a quibble. If the payout falls short you or your estate has to make it up. If you don't have it they can garnishee your future income.

 

All very scary but that's the way it's become.

 

Sadly when an accident happens the victim will usually try to blame someone.

Well victim is the word; it all starts with someone being negligent, otherwise its a non-issue.

Your family only loses it all if you are under-insured. Certainly some of the insurance figures bandied around on here are under by millions, which curious since the premiums, while serious money, don't dominate the total cost of flying.

 

 

[Raytol]

Hi Frank, Good to hear you. I was at the first meeting of the AUF as well.

 

I have a placard in my aircraft that could by pass all the efforts of the lawyers and it reads " DO NOT FLY, OR FLY IN, THIS AIRCRAFT WHILST FEELING REASONABLE"

 

Ray

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

[edit - Turboplanner got his post in while I was composing this...]

 

@turboplanner, an established doctrine of English civil law is "the loss should lie where it falls" and the law of contract, tort and other branches seeks to transfer the loss where the loss was imposed by a third party through negligence, recklessness, etc (which have different legal meanings). In your example above, you are implying the man in the Clapham Omnibus (i,e, the reasonable man) would not have been able to reasonably differentiate the level of risk posed between an airliner and the flat expanses of major airports and an ultralight and a small grass strip?

 

It would be very sad if this is what has become of society for two reasons: 1) man's power of deduction and reasoning as been so diminished that he cannot make a reasonable assessment of risk of anything (say the difference between jumping into the sea at Bells Beach and a local swimming pool) and b) an advanced society such as ours cannot educate man enough to be able to make these decisions based on the information presented to them.

 

Of course, if there was neglect or recklessness in the accident, it would be a different kettle of fish and I accept in these circumstances, there would be evidential difficulty, in which case a country may be at liberty - such a the UK - to presume fault of the pilot and therefore ensure the risk is always borne by a specific party and that the party is aware it is they their responsibility to insure for the risk regardless of the actual circumstances. However, in the absence of such specific direction/law from the state, then, as sad as the outcome of the hypothetical case would be and on the assumption there were no neglect, recklessness or legal compliance issue (e.g. to ensure adequate stopway was mowed through the trees), why should someone else be held responsible for what is, to a reasonable man, an obvious risk that on this case materialised?

 

Or has our own obligation to assess general risks to ourselves and insure against them been dispensed with?

[Jaba-who]

[edit - Turboplanner got his post in while I was composing this...]

 

@turboplanner, an established doctrine of English civil law is "the loss should lie where it falls" and the law of contract, tort and other branches seeks to transfer the loss where the loss was imposed by a third party through negligence, recklessness, etc (which have different legal meanings). In your example above, you are implying the man in the Clapham Omnibus (i,e, the reasonable man) would not have been able to reasonably differentiate the level of risk posed between an airliner and the flat expanses of major airports and an ultralight and a small grass strip?

 

It would be very sad if this is what has become of society for two reasons: 1) man's power of deduction and reasoning as been so diminished that he cannot make a reasonable assessment of risk of anything (say the difference between jumping into the sea at Bells Beach and a local swimming pool) and b) an advanced society such as ours cannot educate man enough to be able to make these decisions based on the information presented to them.

 

Of course, if there was neglect or recklessness in the accident, it would be a different kettle of fish and I accept in these circumstances, there would be evidential difficulty, in which case a country may be at liberty - such a the UK - to presume fault of the pilot and therefore ensure the risk is always borne by a specific party and that the party is aware it is they their responsibility to insure for the risk regardless of the actual circumstances. However, in the absence of such specific direction/law from the state, then, as sad as the outcome of the hypothetical case would be and on the assumption there were no neglect, recklessness or legal compliance issue (e.g. to ensure adequate stopway was mowed through the trees), why should someone else be held responsible for what is, to a reasonable man, an obvious risk that on this case materialised?

 

Or has our own obligation to assess general risks to ourselves and insure against them been dispensed with?

Sadly at least in Oz what is obvious to the man on the Clapham omnibus has been subverted by sneaky legalese.

In my neck of the woods a few years ago a young bloke fell off a cliff at popular tourist spot and was injured.

 

He sued the local council for not protecting him from the dangerous cliff. Although he was found PARTIALLY to blame the council was forced ( through its insurance which we all pay for as rate payers) to then pay for.

 

The reason the council was found predominantly negligent was

1. The fact that a cliff is an obvious danger was not apparently obvious to this idiot. Despite the fact that most people realise that precipitous drops are dangerous.

2. The signs that said to stay back from the edge were not a deterrent and the council should have realised that people don't take notice of signs

3. The fence that bordered the viewing platform was of a construction that the person involved was able to climb over it. It was up to the council to make fences climb proof.

 

In other words the man on the Clapham omnibus is no longer the standard even the courts won't admit it. - it's a drunk idiot who apparently needs protection from himself. And if someone doesn't protect him its society's fault.

 

Same applies to the guy who bought a Piper Cherokee ( I think) and tried to use the pilot manual to teach himself to fly from scratch with the manual in his lap. Crashed and died.

His estate sued the company alleging that a normal person would - on reading the manual which gave worded instructions on general flight controls - would think it was reasonable to believe the manual could be used in such a way. This is despite laws stating that you had to do instruction through a flight school of some sort, you had to do training and gain a licence and that the general public knew that there was requirement for these things etc etc.

So in this case even laws and public knowledge were not enough to the plaintiff. That case was one of the reasons why piper ceased production of light singles.

[spacesailor]

"Who is going to pay for the 55 years of live in nurse, rebuilding the house to suit which adds up to a total cost of around 48 million."

 

I believe that's the roll of the "compulsory insurance scheme" that motorist have to pay. or is it only for Cyclist!.

 

spacesailor

 

 

[Jaba-who]

Well victim is the word; it all starts with someone being negligent, otherwise its a non-issue.Your family only loses it all if you are under-insured. Certainly some of the insurance figures bandied around on here are under by millions, which curious since the premiums, while serious money, don't dominate the total cost of flying.

The problem is negligence is in the eye of the beholder.

I presented a paper at an anaesthesia conference a few years back in which I outlined a study by a national anaesthetic training college.

 

Essentially the study looked at a number of scenarios where anaesthetic complications lead to disasters.

 

The scenarios were presented to an expert panel and they were asked to decide on negligence or not. Only problem was that the scenarios were doubled up and the outcome changed. So the same scenario was modified slightly to hide that it was the same case as another. The outcome was however made opposite. If it was previously a bad outcome it was changed to a good outcome etc.

 

The panel of experts judged that 85% of the bad out come cases were as a result of negligence. But the same cases were only 15% negligent when there was a good outcome. 85% of cases were considered to be within the standard of care and that things go wrong despite the best of care.

 

As for under insurance that's a lot harder to predict what you might need than you might think. - "Blue Sky " claims (ie: basically ridiculously high claims for multi millions) are not unexpected these days if a young person requires a full life of full time care. Or if you have to make up for lost income of a promising young surgeon you would be looking at about a million per year - very easy to go well over the 5 or 10 million that most general aviation insurances cover.

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

Same applies to the guy who bought a Piper Cherokee ( I think) and tried to use the pilot manual to teach himself to fly from scratch with the manual in his lap. Crashed and died.

His estate sued the company alleging that a normal person would - on reading the manual which gave worded instructions on general flight controls - would think it was reasonable to believe the manual could be used in such a way. This is despite laws stating that you had to do instruction through a flight school of some sort, you had to do training and gain a licence and that the general public knew that there was requirement for these things etc etc.

 

So in this case even laws and public knowledge were not enough to the plaintiff. That case was one of the reasons why piper ceased production of light singles.

Is this fact or folk legend? It's not something that I'd heard before anyway.

 

As I understood it, all the major factories stopped producing light singles due to the spurious judgement which found the manufacturer responsible for a collision between a high wing and a low wing (or perhaps one was a biplane), one on climb and the other on let-down. The finding was that the designs were defective because they didn't provide sufficient visibility in the direction of travel. The major manufacturers couldn't reasonably continue to produce those designs following that precedent.

 

Can you point us to a reference to this Piper flight manual autodidact case perhaps? I've tried a number of search terms and not been able to find anything.

 

 

[Jaba-who]

"Who is going to pay for the 55 years of live in nurse, rebuilding the house to suit which adds up to a total cost of around 48 million."I believe that's the roll of the "compulsory insurance scheme" that motorist have to pay. or is it only for Cyclist!.

spacesailor

Well if some party is found negligent then it's that party. If that party has insurance and the payout does not exceed the insurance limit and the insurance company doesn't get out of paying by some means, then it's the insurance company. If the court imposed payout exceeds the Insurance limit then the negligent party makes up the balance.

As for compulsory insurance - Unlike motor vehicles which number millions aviation is a very small number. I am not sure the premiums would cover the payouts. It requires a lot of people putting in a small amount to cover them. Otherwise it would not be viable for the insurers.

 

So if the compulsory scheme still didn't cover payouts then the negligent party would still have to fork out. The lawyers would still be required to sort out who was negligent and who,was not. So maybe no real advance over what we have. I don't know for sure. Just surmising.

 

 

[spacesailor]

My friends son had a motor bike accident & is paralyzed,

 

Tried the "exoskeleton" but was not strong enough to use it.

 

All payed for out of the CPI scheme. as well has his daily nurse.

 

spacesailor