Insurers in Florida today were arranging for the services ofadjusters, anticipating that Hurricane Wilma will be arriving thisweekend as the eighth hurricane to hit the state in 14 months.

"We're finding we have them, but a lot of adjusters are workingin other states," said Sam Miller, executive vice president of theFlorida Insurance Council.

Mark Saunders, a meteorologist with Tropical Storm Risk,Benfield Hazard Research Center in London, said Wilma==which at itspeak today featured wind speeds of 175 miles-per-hour==willprobably hit Southwest Florida as a Category 3 hurricane withsustained wind speeds of 120 mph to 130 mph.

Mr. Miller said his group, which includes 300 property-casualtyinsurers, is "confident it won't come in at 170 mph," adding thatFlorida is "the best prepared state in the country to handle ahurricane."

He said the repeated strikes on the state have meant thatcompanies need to reassess their long-term estimates of catastrophelosses, and "when they do that, a lot are finding their rates aregoing to go up."

Mr. Miller said insurers were "scrounging for adjusters," butadded that "there are plenty of adjusters==we're lining them up. Alot have just finished up in the Gulf States and have come home.They probably weren't expecting to get back to work this soon."

At the Florida Emergency Operations Center, spokesperson ChristyCampbell said personnel there had been monitoring the hurricane'sapproach for a few days.

Yesterday, she said, the center began twice daily coordinationconference calls, which linked preparedness coordinators in SouthFlorida counties that might be affected.

Although the center is now only on Level Two, partial activationstatus, she said mobilization activity has already begun withpre-positioning of ice, water and food supplies.

Florida, she noted, has a strong emergency infrastructure. "Weprepare for this annually," she said.

Wilma hit the maximum Category 5 level on the Safir-Simpsonscale today and was sending drenching rains onto Jamaica, Cuba,Nicaragua and Honduras as it plowed through the Caribbean.