Midwest Storms May Break Loss Records
By Michael Ha
NU Online News Service, May 14, 1:45 p.m. EDT?The recent severe thunderstorms that hit the central United States are likely to set a new record in insured losses, said AIR Worldwide Corporation, a catastrophe modeling company based in Boston.
The current record belongs to the thunderstorm system that struck during April 6-12, 2001. That storm system caused $2.2 billion in losses, the service noted. But this month's series of storm fronts that occurred between May 2 and May 11 was "one of the worst in meteorological terms," Uday Virkud, senior vice president at AIR, told National Underwriter.
"It is likely that the ultimate insured losses could exceed that $2.2 billion figure from 2001," he said, judging from preliminary data and simulations the service has collected to date.
AIR's forecast for the overall insured losses is derived using computer simulation models, and "there is a lot of data still coming in," Mr. Virkud added.
There were some 2,500 reports of straight-line winds and hail during that time, he noted. This highly unusual weather system, he added, was caused by a "stationary weather pattern" in the area that started during the last week of April.
Mr. Virkud observed that this pattern resulted in a jet stream pattern that persisted over the Midwest in the same position for nearly two weeks, creating a continuous threat of severe weather during that period.
"The high financial losses from the system can be attributed to the duration of the weather system and the sheer number of individual tornadoes, hailstorms and straight-line windstorms," he observed.
AIR is a subsidiary of Insurance Services Office. Inc., based in Jersey City, N.J.
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