Aircraft leasing firm Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) has filed a London lawsuit against 11 insurers, including Lloyd’s of London, AIG, Chubb and Swiss Re, two months after it wrote off almost $600m for 19 aircraft stuck in Russia, reported Reuters.
The high court claim also names Abu Dhabi National Insurance, Fidelis Insurance Ireland, HDI Global Speciality, Great Lakes Insurance, Global Aerospace Underwriting Managers, Starr Europe Insurance and AXIS Speciality Europe.
DAE, which said in August it had written off $576.5m for its planes, noted in its half-year results statement in August that it had “no way to determine whether these aircraft will be returned at any point in the future”.
“The group has insurance in respect of the aircraft in question under a number of insurance policies and the group has filed insurance claims to recover amounts due under the policies,” it said.
A spokesperson for Lloyd’s said the insurer was “not at liberty to share information on any specific claim, policy or policyholder”. Munich Re, Great Lakes’ parent, AIG and Swiss Re declined to comment. The other insurers and DAE did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
But lessors have vowed to pursue insurers since losing control of more than 400 leased planes worth almost $10bn after western countries sanctioned Russia over Russia president Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and Moscow blocked the jets from leaving.
The claim has been lodged in London four months after Dublin-based AerCap, the world’s biggest aircraft lessor, filed a $3.5bn insurance lawsuit over more than 100 of its jets seized in Russia. M