RE: AMA Insurance confusion.
Homeowners does kick in first. Most claims probably never even come to the attention of the AMA. Some claims are by those that have no other insurance, and, of course, the AMA is aware of those and pays them. This is the reason the premiums for the AMA liability insurance is reasonably low... a premium reflected in the dues. If this were a primary policy, I would not even venture a guess as to the cost. As a group, we all benefit from the low premium.
You have to keep in mind that about 50% of the claims are generated against clubs and landlords. Normally, the clubs have no other insurance and the landlord coverage is primary, not secondary. These are the areas where a lot of the larger claims are paid. These are the coverages, to a large extent, that allow us to have flying sites. How many landlords would allow our activities without coveage? There are even some landlords that would not allow club meetings to take place without coveage... places where there is no flying at all.
The largest bodily injury settlement, due to flying, was 1.3 million to a CL participant. The largest property damage settlement was for a fire casued by a FF model. Those do not include non-flying type accidents. It's fairly easy to see where it is a safe and honest statement to say that over 20 years "millions have been paid".
The AMA discloses the "lump" amount of all settlements in years where all the claims for a year have been settled. On average, there are 4 years with open claims, where the information is unavailable. The disclosures are on the AMA web site, in stand alone documents or in the Digital Archives.... if you can find them.
JR