A federal appeals court has ruled the two plane crashes at the World Trade Centre on 11 September 2001 are to be considered as one event for the purpose of insurance. This means only one payout is needed, said a report.
The verdict was handed down by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, and endorsed an earlier district court ruling.
The court ruled that the three insurers of the WTC complex are bound by documents which define the New York attacks as a single occurrence requiring only one payment.
The three insurers involved are units of Royal & SunAlliance, St Paul and Hartford Financial Services Group. The court said they had agreed to documents, known as WilProp, which defined a single occurrence to include "a series of similar causes", such as the events of 11 September.
The ruling is said to be a setback for the WTC's leaseholder, Larry Silverstein, and the government agencies who were hoping that more than the US$3.5bn face value of the WTC would be available for rebuilding Ground Zero, according to the report.
Silverstein is said to have argued that the attack, involving two airlines, constituted two occurrences obliging insurers to give two separate payouts.
He said the ruling involved only three of the 22 insurers for the WTC and had responsibility for only 3% of the coverage, the report continued.
Other court cases on the issue are still outstanding.
