USA – NEW YORK Trends and Developments Contributed by: Bradley Nash, John Curley and Dorothea Regal, Hoguet Newman Regal & Kenney, LLP
Hoguet Newman Regal & Kenney, LLP One Grand Central Place 60 East 42nd Street
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CGL Insurer Required To Provide Defence Coverage for a PFAS-Related Environmental Claim In Town of Harrietstown v Westchester Fire Ins. Co. , 2025 WL 2391758 (N.D.N.Y. Aug. 18, 2025), a federal district judge held that a municipality’s liability insurer was required to provide defence coverage for a PFAS- related environmental contamination claim at a region- al airport, holding that a carve-out to the policy’s pol- lution exclusion for claims “caused by or resulting in a crash fire explosion or collision” preserved coverage. The policyholder, Town of Harrietstown, owns and operates Adirondack Regional Airport in upstate New York. Pursuant to regulations of the Federal Aviation Administration, the airport used aqueous film-form- ing foam (AFFF) to extinguish fires – a product that is known to contain PFAS. The airport was required by the Federal Aviation Administration to use AFFF to extinguish fires. AFFF is known to contain PFAS. A New York state envi- ronmental agency (the Department of Environmental Conservation) brought an environmental contamina- tion claim against the Town and issued a Superfund Site Classification Notice, identifying the airport as a “significant threat to public health and/or the environ- ment” due to PFAS contamination. The Town sought coverage from its insurers under an airport owners and operators general liability policy. After initially providing a defence, subject to a reser- vation of rights, the insurers disclaimed any duty to
As an international centre of business and finance, New York is a frequent venue for high-stakes insur- ance coverage disputes. This past year was no excep- tion in this regard. In 2025, state and federal courts in New York grappled with the insurance implications of a host of headline-grabbing topics, from claims involv- ing environmental contamination by so-called forever chemicals to the fallout of civil unrest resulting from contested elections in Venezuela. Some of the lead- ing New York insurance law cases the firm has been following this year include: • a federal district court decision concerning cov- erage under a commercial general liability (CGL) policy for a per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS)-related environmental claim; • a New York state appellate decision concerning the standard for determining whether multiple claims are “related” (and therefore deemed to constitute a single claim) under a claims-made liability policy; • a rare court decision concerning the method for allocating a settlement between covered and non- covered loss under a D&O policy; and • a Second Circuit decision concerning whether the refusal of the recently-deposed Venezuelan president Maduro to cede power following 2018 elections constituted an “insurrection”, triggering coverage under a marine cargo policy for a seizure of crude oil.
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