From Drudge: CHARLEY SECOND MOST-EXPENSIVE NATURAL DISASTER IN MODERN HISTORY; DAMAGE COULD TOP $20 BILLION
================================================================ Part I Top 10 Catastrophes Fri Aug 13, 6:27 PM ET By The Associated Press Top 10 catastrophic events for insured property losses, according to Insurance Services Office Inc. of Jersey City, N.J. The company defines a catastrophe as a single incident or series of related incidents � man-made or natural � that cause insured property losses totaling at least $25 million and affect a significant number of policyholders and insurers. Catastrophes with equivalent amounts of damage are listed with the same rank. The following numbers are inflation adjusted to 2002 dollars. 1. Terrorist attack (New York, Virginia, Pennsylvania), September 2001 � $20.7 billion. 2. Hurricane Andrew, August 1992 � $19.9 billion. 3. Northridge, Calif., earthquake, January 1994 � $15.2 billion. 4. Hurricane Hugo, September 1989 � $6.1 billion. 5. Hurricane Georges, September 1998 � $3.3 billion. 6. Midwest, South tornadoes, May 2003 � $3.1 billion. 7. Tropical Storm Allison, July 2001 � $2.5 billion. 7. Hurricane Opal, October 1995 � $2.5 billion. 9. Midwest, South tornadoes, April 2001 � $2.2 billion. 9. Northeast winter storm, March 1993 � $2.2 billion. ===================================================================================== Part II Storm may cost $20 billion Insurance adjustors assess Charley's damage to Florida By Joseph B. Treaster The New York Times Saturday, August 14, 2004 - Damage inflicted by Hurricane Charley as it ripped across the midsection of Florida on Friday and early Saturday could exceed $20 billion dollars, making it one of the most costly storms in history, economic analysts said. Karen Clark, the chief executive of AIR Worldwide, a Boston firm that provides damage assessments for insurance companies, said some of the most severe destruction came from surging seas sweeping across the barrier islands and beaches of Florida's Gulf Coast in the vicinity of Punta Gorda as the hurricane first made landfall. But Clark and field representatives of insurance companies said Orlando, with its glistening downtown office towers, Walt Disney World and other huge theme parks, was also hit hard even though the storm's gusts were diminishing as it moved through the center of the state and skimmed past Daytona Beach on its way to the Atlantic Ocean. "We have a swath of damage across the state," she said. "Lee and Charlotte Counties on the west coast were the hardest hit. But the damage in Orlando is also significant." Hundreds of house trailers were destroyed in Port Charlotte and surrounding Charlotte County, said Loretta Worters, a spokeswoman for the Insurance Information Institute, who is monitoring developments from New York for her trade group. She said government buildings in the county suffered heavy damage and that there were reports Saturday morning that fires had broken out in the ruins of some houses near the town of Arcadia in Desoto County. She said that a hospital in Arcadia was badly damaged and that the Turner Agri-Civic Center there, where concerts and sports events have been held, was destroyed. The hurricane weakened moving into the Carolinas, and Clark estimated that it might cause several hundred million more in damages there and farther up the coast. Hurricane Charley may be the second-most devastating storm in modern times after Hurricane Andrew, which battered South Florida in 1992 at a cost of more than $25 billion. RMS, a California company that also assesses storm damage for insurance companies, estimated late Friday that the cost of Hurricane Charley to insurers would be about $5 billion. A much smaller portion of the damage of Hurricane Charley will be covered by insurance than with Hurricane Andrew, industry experts said, because flooding, for which most people do not have coverage, has been more extensive in this storm and also because the insurance industry has shifted a significant portion of hurricane damage costs to individual homeowners, businesses and state government. Clark estimated losses to the insurance industry could be $6 billion to $10 billion in Florida. That compares with $15.5 billion in insured losses in Hurricane Andrew, which in today's dollars would come to about $20 billion. "The biggest losses are going to be from storm surges," Clark said. Standard insurance policies on homes and businesses do not offer protection from flooding, and only one in four homeowners in the most likely flood areas buys the limited coverage that is provided by the federal government. But Floridians have been the most willing buyers of flood insurance. Forty percent of the 4.5 million flood insurance policies in America have been sold there. The federal government started providing flood insurance years ago after commercial insurers refused to do so, saying the only likely customers would be people who expected to suffer a loss. In such a situation, the insurers would lose the ability to spread their costs over a wide range of customers, many of whom would have no losses. When losses occurred in a larger group, they would be somewhat random. But the insurance industry began working hard to limit coverage and cut potential losses after the stunning expenses of Hurricane Andrew, which temporarily staggered some of the giants like State Farm and Allstate and drove some smaller insurers out of business. Now all the initial costs of a hurricane must be borne by customers along the Atlantic and Gulf Seaboard. In that huge sweep of territory, the insurers have begun imposing deductibles of one to five percent on policyholders in place of the widespread deductible of $500 that most homeowners in America choose. The result is that the owner of a $100,000 home with a 5 percent deductible pays the first $5,000 in losses rather than $500. In many cases, the insurers also have stopped covering hurricane damage along the coasts and, instead, managed to transfer the risky business to state funds. The fund in Florida charges relatively high premiums for limited coverage. In Florida, the state has also established a fund of $15 billion, partly through contributions from the insurance companies, that is intended to pay most of the insured losses over $4.5 billion. As dawn broke Saturday in Florida, hundreds of claims adjusters were making their way through the wreckage of the state, beginning detailed assessments of the damage and handing out checks for thousands of dollars to their customers for temporary living expenses and emergency repairs. They produced some of the earliest accounts of Charley's fierce handiwork. "It looks bad," said Chris Neal, a spokesman for State Farm who rode out the storm in his five-bedroom ranch house in Winter Haven with his wife, Laura, a claims adjuster, and their daughter, Morgan, 4, who dressed up for the event in her favorite costume, the kind of clothes worn by Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. "There is very significant damage in Winter Haven," Neal said on Saturday. "We haven't had electricity since seven o'clock last night. There are lots of roofs blown off, street signs and traffic lights down. I drove past a 7-Eleven this morning and all the signs were down and the canopy over the gas pumps had collapsed. There are a lot of trees down. They can do the most significant damage." In Winter Haven and other central Florida towns, Neal said, most people did not have storm shutters nor did they cover their windows with sheets of plywood as south Floridians usually do when they hear a hurricane is coming. For one thing, hurricanes do not normally chop through the center of the state the way Hurricane Charley did. And, for another, like so many previous storms it did not follow its predicted route. ______________________________________________________ RollTideFan - The University of Alabama Athletics Discussion List "Welcome to RollTideFan! Wear a cup!" 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