12 AIRLINES WAIVE LIMIT ON LIABILITY.Byline: Daily News Wire Services Twelve U.S. airlines have voluntarily waived the $75,000 liability limit for death or injury to a passenger on international flights, a limit established under the Warsaw Convention Not to be confused with the Warsaw Pact, which was a defence treaty between Eastern European nations. The Warsaw Convention is an international convention which regulates liability for international carriage of persons, luggage or goods performed by aircraft for reward. which the U.S. government has been trying to raise almost since it was set in 1966. The major airlines that have signed on are American Airlines American Airlines Major U.S. airline. American was created through a merger of several smaller U.S. airlines and incorporated in 1934. It continued to buy the routes of other airlines, becoming an international carrier in the 1970s; its routes include South America, the , Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Hawaiian Airlines Hawaiian Airlines is the 11th largest commercial airline in the United States. It is the largest airline based in the State of Hawai'i and is commonly referred to by the acronym "HAL". , Northwest Airlines, Trans World Airlines Trans World Airlines, commonly known as TWA, was a major American airline company that was acquired by American Airlines in April 2001. For many years it was headquartered at the Kansas City Downtown Airport, as well as midtown Manhattan in New York City. , United Airlines and USAir. So have four smaller companies: American Eagle, AMR (1) (Adaptive Multi-Rate) A variable rate speech codec selected by the 3GPP for the 3G evolution of the GSM cellphone system (WCDMA). Using the Algebraic CELP (ACELP) compression technology, AMR provides toll quality sound at transmission rates from 4.75 to 12. Combs, Continental Micronesia and Tower Air. For years, some foreign carriers and governments had blocked any change in the convention. But the airlines, with the backing of the U.S. government, got around the objections by making the change in the form of new tariffs - essentially, fare schedules - that they filed with the Transportation Department. The new tariffs also stipulate that survivors can sue in a foreign court under U.S. law. This is important because courts outside the United States seldom award damages - as U.S. courts do - based on the lifetime earnings that the victim could have expected. Under the old system, survivors' families could not collect more than $75,000 unless they could show willful misconduct. That led to tedious trials that the airlines hope to avoid now. Under Warsaw rules, the ability of American families to get into U.S. courts depended on a variety of factors that probably did not seem important before the crash, like which country the tickets were purchased in. If the court will follow U.S. laws, the venue is less important. The new system means the breakdown in uniformity of an international system that has been fairly straightforward since 1929, when it was codified cod·i·fy tr.v. cod·i·fied, cod·i·fy·ing, cod·i·fies 1. To reduce to a code: codify laws. 2. To arrange or systematize. as the Warsaw Convention. |
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