Rising hail claims raise questions for insurers

On average, the NOAA’s National Weather Service receives approximately 10,000 to 12,000 hail reports a year. In 2010, the service stopped reporting hail smaller than 1 inch in diameter because little damage is usually associated with hail of this size. According to The Hail Reporter, within the contiguous 48 states, most states have an average of 120 reports a year involving hail greater than 1 inch in size.

Where the hail falls matters more than the actual size, since 1-inch hail in a metropolitan area like Chicago or New York will do far more damage than larger sized hail that falls in a more uninhabited area like Montana. The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) found that Texas led the country in hail claims from 2010-2012 with 320,823. Rounding out the top 10 states with hail claims during that period were Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Illinois, Tennessee, Indiana, Arizona and Kentucky, with a total of almost 1.3 million claims.