NU Online News Service, May 21, 2:46 p.m.EDT

As a spokesman for State Farm, Jim Camoriano has worked theaftermaths of hurricanes Gustav and Ike in 2008, as wellas many tornadoes.

“The Joplin tornado was by far the most riveting,” he says. “AsI drove through the city, it became apparent that this event wasgoing into the record books.”

State Farm's data does not isolate the vast destruction causedby the EF-5 tornado that devastated Joplin on May 22, 2011 becauseit started several days of tornadoes in Missouri from May 22-26.During this time the largest writer of home and auto insurancereceived about 16,500 claims and has paid more than $209 million topolicyholders.

The storm system that spawned the tornado in Joplin also causedwind and hail damage in nine other states. Adding these, State Farmhas received more than 75,000 claims and paid out more than $601million.

After the twister in Joplin, it appeared as if “livelihoods werestacked into heaps of brick, wood and glass,” says Camoriano.

American Family Insurance expects to make payments totaling $116million on 2,400 claims in Joplin. The insurer sponsored an episodeof “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” to help the community rebuild,says spokesman Ken Muth, who adds that an agent's office in Joplinwas demolished. The agent was relocated to another agent's officeso he could begin helping customers.

“In this situation, we don't work much from the office anyway,”Muth says. “We're out visiting customers at their homes, or what isleft of them. The damage was unbelievable.”

American Family is also sponsoring several events, including amemorial run for the 161 lives lost in the tornado, to mark theone-year anniversary.

Jerry Davies, spokesman for Farmers Insurance, says the event“was beyond belief in the ferocity and velocity of thetornado.”

The insurer set up a mobile claims truck at a local Wal-Mart andan agent got Tyson Foods and another distributor to bring meat andvegetables.

“They set up a cooking area using the agent's home grills andagents and volunteers fed 115,000 people that first weekend,working 16 hours per day,” Davies says.

Camoriano says the image of a child's teddy bear next to an openBible changed his perception of natural disasters.

“It became an individual event for me, where before it was easyto get caught up in talking simply about x-number of claims,” heexplains. It made me ask some tough questions. Did the childrenmake it out of this house alive? What would it be like to loseeverything in a matter of seconds?”

Camoriano says the Joplin tornado renewed his focus on the goalof helping people get back to normal lives.