No insurance compensation for the Jumbo floating restaurant, the company says

The company’s loss is not covered by the insurance from the incident of Hong Kong’s Jumbo Floating Restaurant that happened on June 18, the statement from Aberdeen Restaurant Enterprises Limited said on Sunday night. 

The floating restaurant holds insurance only to indemnify and compensate the third party, according to the statement. “Where the assured has effected an insurance in express terms against any liability to a third party, the measure of indemnity, subject to any express provision in the policy, is the amount paid or payable by the assured to the third party in respect of such liability,” according to section 74 of Cap. 329 Marine Insurance Ordinance. 

Until June 26, the floating restaurant and its tugboats remained in the area of Xisha Island in the South China Sea. The company has noticed the Sansha Maritime Affairs Bureau. 

According to the statement released by the company on June 20, the seawater entered the vessel soon after the accident due to the poor weather conditions and capsized on June 18. It said that the vessel was sunk over 1,000 metres, which made the salvage works extremely difficult.

Local media reported that the vessel was “sunk” on June 20 but their public relations representative did not clarify the sayings. 

The Hong Kong Marine Department (HKMD) mentioned that before the media began reporting on the sinking of the floating restaurant, HKMD had not received any notification from the vessel’s owner before June 23. 

While HKMD responded to the media request that the vessel’s owner submitted the written report regarding the incident on June 23. They cited from the report that the Jumbo floating restaurant was “capsized” and it is still in the water near the Paracel Islands. The official did not indicate that it was “sunk”. 

The company replied in the statement on Sunday that their responses are consistent with the report submitted to the Marine Department. 

Claiming that the company did not violate the law that submitting a marine accident report 24 hours after the ship arrives at its next port of call if the ship is not within the waters of Hong Kong at the time of the accident, according to section 12 of the Merchant Shipping Regulation. 

Jumbo Kingdom is a 46-year-old iconic landmark located in Sham Wan that famous public figures such as Tom Cruise and Queen Elizabeth II have visited before. Hong Kong movies like God of cookery and Enter the Dragon were filmed in the floating restaurant. 

However, the restaurant was closed in March 2020 as the business was severely affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. The company has accumulated a loss of almost one hundred million since 2013. 

The company planned to donate the Jumbo Kingdom to Ocean Park unconditionally as part of “Invigorating Island South”, a government plan for education and conservation purposes in 2020. But yet to find any third-party operator to run it last year. 

“Just because I mentioned it in the policy statement did not mean that the government would utilize taxpayer funds to keep the vessel afloat,” said Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor in the press conference on May 31. 

With the marine license of the Jumbo floating restaurant expired in mid-June, the company decided to move it out of Hong Kong without disclosing the destination.

“We have to let it go,” said Li Kit, 81, who has lived in Aberdeen since the 1940s. “Our family used to have meals in the floating restaurants during the Chinese New Year or held wedding banquet in it. However, the price keeps rising in recent years, and the neighbors cannot afford to have tea there frequently.”