Latest Catastrophe Headlines
All the headlines from our Catastrophe Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Russia Declares Emergency as Wildfires Kill 40, Displace Thousands
Aug 3 2010 // Russia’s leaders declared a state of emergency on Monday in seven provinces and ordered authorities to guard weapons storage facilities from wildfires that have killed at least 40 people. Thousands more have lost...
July’s Catastrophes Cause Widespread Losses Globally: Aon Benfield
Aug 3 2010 // Floods in Pakistan and China have taken thousands of lives and damaged hundreds of thousands of homes, according to a new report on catastrophic events in July by a reinsurance team. A European heatwave, wildfires in...
Tornado Touches Down in NE Corner of Montana, Kills 2
Jul 28 2010 // A rare tornado tore through a farmhouse and killed two people inside, leaving nothing but the house’s foundation and a few twisted vehicles as it swept through Montana’s remote and sparsely populated...
Tornado Damages 18 Condos in Western New York
Jul 26 2010 // A tornado tore through western New York on Saturday, ripping the roof off a condominium and damaging 17 others and causing widespread power outages. The National Weather Service said the twister touched down in Mayville in...
Tropical Storm Threatens Gulf Oil Disaster Containment
Jul 23 2010 // BP Plc oil spill workers in the Gulf of Mexico prepared for a possible evacuation Thursday as a tropical storm threatened more delays in attempts to end the environmental disaster. The U.S. National Hurricane Center said...
Florida Braces for Tropical Storm Bonnie
Jul 23 2010 // Tropical Storm Bonnie barreled toward south Florida Friday on a track that was expected to take it over the site of BP Plc’s massive oil spill in the energy-rich Gulf of Mexico by Saturday afternoon. The fast-moving...
Typhoon Chanthu Hits South China – AIR Report
Jul 23 2010 // According to catastrophe risk modeling firm AIR Worldwide, Typhoon Chanthu slammed into southern China near Wuchuan City in Guangdong Province on Thursday, “further drenching a region already inundated by a month of...
Is Global Warming Causing More Frequent, More Powerful Hurricanes?
Jul 21 2010 // A workshop held in Lloyd’s Old Library sought to answer that question, by examining the impact global warming could have on the hurricane season. Lloyd’s cited the fact that “analysis of weather patterns...
Private Firm WSI Cuts U.S. Hurricane Forecast to 19 Named Storms
Jul 21 2010 // Private weather forecaster WSI Corp cut its forecast for named storms in the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season on Tuesday, but still sees an active season with water temperatures and wind conditions conducive to violent...
NHC Tracking Potential Tropical Storm
Jul 20 2010 // The National Hurricane Center in Miami is currently tracking a “vigorous tropical wave located over Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.” So far the disturbance has produced only “widespread cloudiness and...
Minor Earthquake Shakes Up U.S. Capital
Jul 19 2010 // Earthquakes are so rare in the Washington area that even a geology student wasn’t quite sure what was going on when a minor one hit early Friday. Was it a truck passing by? A low-flying plane? Gerasimos...
Aon Benfield Launches First Pan-Asian Typhoon Model
Jul 19 2010 // Impact Forecasting, Aon Benfield’s catastrophe model development center, has launched the first fully functional Asian typhoon model to span the continent. “The new model will help insurers analyze the...
China Braces for Typhoon Conson; Vietnam Evacuates Thousands
Jul 16 2010 // Southern China on Friday battened down to await the arrival of Typhoon Conson, gathering strength over the South China Sea, and Vietnam deployed nearly 3,000 troops to areas in the path of the storm. Swollen rivers and...
Gale Force Winds Needed to Re-Inflate Insurance Share Prices
Jul 16 2010 // Nobody wishes for a natural disaster, but there’s nothing like a big U.S. hurricane to revitalize shares in property and casualty insurers, currently weighed down by persistently weak insurance prices. Nine analysts...
Ohio Tornadoes Cost Home, Business Owners $22M
Jul 16 2010 // The insurance industry says a storm and tornadoes that ripped through northwest Ohio in early June caused at least $22.1 million in damage for homeowners and business owners. The totals by the Ohio Insurance Institute...
Hanover Estimates $85 Million Catastrophe Loss for Q2
Jul 14 2010 // Worcester, Mass.-based The Hanover estimated its pre-tax losses resulting from catastrophe events in the second quarter of 2010 to be approximately $85 million. The majority of the losses were associated with six...
Munich Re Provides $96 Million Cat Bond to Mass. Property Association
Jul 12 2010 // Munich Re has provided the Massachusetts Property Insurance Underwriting Association (MPIUA) with a $ 96 million catastrophe bond issuance that “transfers hurricane risk in Massachusetts to the capital...
Massachusetts Fair Plan Gets $96M Catastrophe Bond
Jul 12 2010 // The Massachusetts Property Insurance Underwriting Association (MPIUA) has received a $96 million catastrophe bond issuance that transfers hurricane risk in Massachusetts to the capital markets, a number of reinsurers...
First Half 2010 Catastrophe Losses Double Average at $22 Billion
Jul 8 2010 // A report from Munich Re (www.munichre.com) notes that the first half of 2010 was “marked by an exceptionally large number of natural catastrophes and the scale of the losses they caused.” The reinsurer recorded...
Actuarially Sound Property Rates Remain Elusive Along Texas Coast
Jul 7 2010 // Insurance company interests have long complained that the state-backed Texas Windstorm Insurance Association charges rates that are not actuarially sound for the risks it insures, making it impossible for private insurers...
