Catastrophe risk modelling firm AIR Worldwide has revealed its estimated losses from Hurricane Zeta’s winds and storm surge to be from USD 1.5 billion to USD 3.5 billion.
Included in AIR’s estimates are losses to onshore residential, commercial, and industrial properties and automobiles for their building, contents, and time element coverage.
According to AIR, Zeta was a high-end Category 2 storm with 1-minute sustained wind speeds of 110 mph, which is just 1 mph shy of a Category 3, which would have classified it as a major hurricane.
As the fifth named storm to make landfall in Louisiana this season, it also broke the record for the number of named storms to make landfall in Louisiana in one season set in 2002.
Hurricane Zeta made landfall just three weeks after Hurricane Delta and about nine weeks after Hurricane Laura. While Laura and Delta made landfall just 12 miles apart, Zeta made landfall about 150 miles east of their landfall locations and west of where Sally made landfall on September 16.
After landfall, Zeta moved through Louisiana and into Mississippi with gusts of up to 100 mph observed, and hurricane conditions impacted Mississippi and Alabama.
By Thursday morning, Zeta had weakened to a tropical storm over central Alabama, although strong gusts continued to impact northeastern Alabama, northern Georgia, the Carolinas, and southeastern Virginia through Thursday as Zeta’s remnants trekked northeastward.
Meanwhile, property information and analytics provider CoreLogic has released its own residential and commercial wind and storm surge loss estimates for the hurricane to be slightly higher than AIR’s.
According to the new data, insured wind losses for residential and commercial properties in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama are estimated to be between $2.2 billion and $3.5 billion. Insured storm surge losses are estimated to be an additional $0.3 billion to $0.5 billion.
Curtis McDonald, meteorologist and senior product manager of CoreLogic commented: “With one month to go, this hurricane season has been incredibly destructive due to the consistent cadence of storms and their too-similar landfall paths. While southwestern Louisiana was largely spared from Hurricane Zeta, New Orleans fell directly in the storm’s quick-moving path.
“The important thing right now is to restore power to the millions of homes in the southeastern states, continue damage repairs in previously impacted homes and prepare for what could be record-breaking hurricane activity in November.”
Tom Larsen, principal, insurance solutions at CoreLogic added: “Natural disasters are increasing in frequency and severity across the board. Sophisticated catastrophe modelling estimates the impact of natural disasters with greater certainty, a key solution to addressing underinsurance issues and risk mitigation. It is imperative for mortgage lenders and insurance carriers to begin leveraging technology to better protect homeowners, accelerate local economic recovery and protect their business.”
