Whilst going against the general tone of replys, I think it needs to be said that there are two sides to this.
Its not fair for the airport to ground this airplane, I fly at Blackpool and its pretty shameful that the debts of comed accrued to this level. I think it remains to be said that Comed were on "life support" from the airport for a considerable length of time. Im pretty sure that supporting a company that is insolvent is against the law. The airport needs to be brought to task about this. Is also probable that if the airport was privately owned (not local authority) the management would have been probably sacked by now for alllowing debts of this magnitude to accrue.
Anyway this isn't a comed/ba topic so forgive me.
All the aircraft owners who hired out their plane through comed did so for a gain of some sort. Some of those owners who used the revenue to subsidise their own flying should look a little inwardly and ask themselves did they back the right horse in Comed. You can't have it all your own way. Ask yourself did you ever worry about who was managing the plane, were your cheques ever late? did you have absolutely no warning signs at all????
As far as the operator question is concerned lets look at how it appears.
Who invoiced the flight?
In the "Where to fly guide" in pilot, who advertised the plane the owner or the operator? not a legal issue but its the sort of thing that would be pulled from a lawyers briefcase at a timely moment
how many hours a month did the "owner" fly compared to "operator"?
You can argue about the meaning of the word operator all you like, but get any reasonable judge and a good barrister and common sense will prevail - you can not make an ass out of the law this will probably be the basis of bpl's case.
Having said that I dearly hope you get your Airplane back it pains me every time I turn up at the airport to see the management "Trophies" parked up padlocked to a baggage cart, if its not a bandit its a jetstream.
Im not for bashing Comed but they have acted as nearly as irresponsibly as the airport management. They were happy to create revenue from your aeroplane, they could have perhaps called you in the day before being declared bankrupt and said clear the fuel bill or you'll be impounded.
Sincerely hope to see all the aircraft flying again soon.
Apologies in advance if any of this is based on hearsay and the considerable amount of rumour flying round BPL