Common Disaster

• Author: Jeffrey Lehman, Shirelle Phelps

Page 30

A set of circumstances in which two individuals die apparently simultaneously.

In a common disaster there is no certainty of who died first, an important issue that frequently arises in the determination of the inheritance of property or the distribution of proceeds of a life insurance policy.

The common disaster clause found in insurance policies and wills is a provision that names an alternate beneficiary in the event that the testator and legatee or the insured and the beneficiary die simultaneously. SIMULTANEOUS...