Modelers: Rita Loss At $2.5-To-$7 Billion

Catastrophe modelers estimated insured losses from Saturday's Hurricane Rita damage to Gulf Coast areas of Texas and Louisiana could total from $2.5 billion to $7 billion.

AIR Worldwide Corp. in Boston on Saturday put the range of its estimate as between $2.5 billion and $5 billion. Eqecat in Oakland, Calif., said the loss could range from $3 billion to $6 billion. Risk Management Solutions in Newark, Calif., came in with the biggest estimate--with a prediction of between $4 billion and $7 billion.

Total losses for Texas were put by authorities there at $8 billion.

The Eqecat figure was a sharp drop from an estimate Friday before the storm made landfall, when the company was predicting an insured loss of between $9 billion and $18 billion.

Eqecat said it reduced the number because the storm had weakened and taken a more easterly course, affecting an area with a "lower density of values at risk."

AIR said the relatively low insured loss for a Category 3 hurricane with winds of 120 miles an hour at landfall was due to the fact that the storm's highest winds tracked over sparsely populated areas of the western Louisiana coast.

Jayanta Guin, AIR's vice president of research, said it was fortunate that the heavy commercial and industrial areas of Port Arthur and Beaumont, Texas, with their numerous oil refineries, were to the left of the storm's track, where wind speeds are lower.

AIR, he said, does not expect to see significant structural damage to the refineries, and Texas Gov. Rick Perry reported yesterday that oil platforms along the Texas coast seem to be in relatively good shape.

Dr. Guin said that Rita losses would be lower than those caused by Hurricane Katrina because Katrina maintained its intensity at landfall, while Rita weakened significantly.