Normally the aircraft insurance does not cover the crew this is a separate workers compensation insurance for the operators AOC requirement.
That depends very much on the owner/operator. The last three companies for which I flew provided differing levels of insurance cover for crew. All provided life insurance and differing levels of additional insurance (sickness, loss of licence etc). Of the African companies I worked for (as opposed to companies I flew for in Africa), one provided accident insurance, the others nothing. Under most regulatory authorities the minimum legal level of insurance will be:
- passengers
- baggage
- third party cover
- cargo
- risks of war and terrorism (‘war risk’)
I suspect (but don’t know) sadly that William would only have been covered if he had taken out insurance himself.