I got bored this arvo, too wet to do any gardening and I didn't feel like taking the RV out for a bath in the passing showers so I found the following insurance requirements from relevant airport 'conditions of use' documents, all applicable for anything likely to be flown by your average weekend warrior. A lot of these documents also require you to note the relevant airport operator as having an interest in the policy too. The list
is not exhaustive, I CBF'd going through
every airport nationwide, but as a general guide it's eye-opening...
In descending order from those that made me snort my cuppa over the keyboard, we have:
- LAUNCESTON (!) being the clear winner with $50,000,000 AUD
(Though their definition of "Operator" in their CoU define it as "any airline that uses the facilities.....")
- Gold (-plated??) Coast, Townsville, Mt Isa & Longreach all require: $35M USD
- Sydney International: $25M USD
- Alice Springs, Darwin & Ayres Rock: $30M AUD
- Albury, Bankstown, Cairns, Camden, Canberra, Essendon, Hobart, Jandakot, Karratha, Mackay, Rocky & Port Hedland: $20M AUD
- Moorabbin: $10M AUD
- Archerfield & Parafield: NIL Required, so far as I could see!
$50,000,000 third-party to fly into Launy....$35M (USD, too!) to lob into Mt Isa for fuel enroute to Darwin in a 700Kg RV, or a sub-600Kg Jabiru? They've got rocks in their heads. But again "We may deny you use of the facilities...yadda yadda" if you fail to produce proof when asked. Given the vast majority of vehicular CTP policies only give you $20M third-party coverage it's got me stuffed how some airports think they need such extraordinary indemnities.
And that's before you even touch on any
landing or
parking fees at any of these places...
I found another lovely little tidbit in
Cessnock's Operational Polict & User Guidelines
"All refuelling is to be done at fixed fuel facilities at the North-Eastern end of the airport. Aircraft are not permitted to refuel from drums, portable bowsers, or portable tanks". Guess that means no more taking jerry cans of Mogas to refuel the Tecnam there at the Flying Club hangars, you've gotta use the Avgas bowser, even if Rotax say Unleaded is the preferred fuel, too bad!