PERILS Raises Insured Loss Estimate for Cyclone Debbie to A$1.7B (US$1.34B)

The property insurance market’s loss for tropical cyclone Debbie has risen to A$1.7 billion (US$1.34 billion), according to PERILS, the independent Zurich-based organization that provides industry-wide catastrophe insurance data.

This is the and third loss estimate PERILS has issued for Tropical Cyclone Debbie, which affected the Australian states of Queensland and New South Wales from March 28, 2017 until the early part of April. The second loss estimate of A$1.4 billion ($1.1 billion) was issued by PERILS on June 28, 2017, three months after the event.

PERILS said this is the first time that a market loss footprint from an Australian catastrophe event, based on collected insurance loss data, is available at a postcode level and by property line of business. The data has also been divided between those losses classified as “Cyclone” and those classified as “Flood.”

The loss footprint information is complemented by postcode-level gust-speed values sourced from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) and Risk Frontiers, and by postcode-level rain intensity measures provided by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM).

By combining this information with PERILS market sums insured, users can derive damage degree functions as a percentage of Total Sums Insured (TSI). Further, it enables them to validate vulnerability functions in probabilistic catastrophe models with actual, high-quality and independent market data, among other uses.

“We are very happy to be able to make available loss data for Tropical Cyclone Debbie at such a granular level, particularly given the significance of this event for the Australian insurance market,” said Darryl Pidcock, head of PERILS Asia-Pacific. “The loss footprint has been produced by collecting detailed loss data from insurance companies active in Australia.”

In line with the PERILS loss reporting schedule, the fourth loss estimate for Tropical Cyclone Debbie will be released on March 28, 2018, 12 months after the event.

Source: PERILS

Related:

• Australia’s Cyclone Debbie Estimated to Cost Insurers US$825.7M: PERILS
• Insurers to Pay an Estimated $1.3B for Cyclone Debbie: Swiss Re
• Cat-Insurance Data Provider PERILS Expands Into Australia

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