Analysts estimate the category 3 storm has already racked up a preliminary cost of $9.36bn, straining the insurance industry
Hurricane Idalia could become the costliest climate disaster to hit the US this year, analysts say, with massive implications for insurance and risk management industries.
The category 3 storm that barreled into Florida’s west coast from the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, then carved a path of destruction and flooding through Georgia and the Carolinas, has a preliminary price tag of $9.36bn, based on early estimates, according to risk analysts at UBS.
It follows 15 previous “individual weather and climate disasters” recorded in the US already this year by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) as unprecedented heat, wildfires, storms and floods escalate.
Cumulatively, Noaa said that by the end of July, which Nasa said was Earth’s hottest month on record, the total estimated cost of the damage caused by the disasters was $39.7bn. That figure does not include the estimated $5.5bn cost to rebuild the town of Lahaina following devastating wildfires that razed the Hawaii island of Maui this month.
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