Latest Catastrophe Headlines
All the headlines from our Catastrophe Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Firefighters in Stalemate Against Calif. Wildfires
Jul 1 2008 // Firefighters have battled more than a thousand wildfires burning throughout Northern California to a stalemate, but forecasters said dangerous fire conditions will not relent anytime soon. No new major fires had broken out...
Swiss Re Places $150 Million Vega Securitization
Jul 1 2008 // Swiss Re announced that it has obtained $150 million worth of protection against North Atlantic hurricanes, European windstorms, Californian earthquakes and Japanese earthquakes and typhoons through a natural catastrophe...
Willis Research Network Joins in California Earthquake Study
Jun 30 2008 // The Willis Research Network, part of Willis Group Holdings Ltd., the global insurance broker, has joined with the U.S. Geological Survey and the California Geological Survey to develop a scenario that shows how a magnitude...
Cat Bond Sales Seen Slowing
Jun 27 2008 // Catastrophe bonds, which allow investors to make bets on disaster, have thrived in recent years, but a number of factors are seen cooling this obscure part of the debt market in 2008. The growth of catastrophe, or...
Hurricane Chief: Funds, Research Can Improve Hurricane Forecasting
Jun 26 2008 // The National Hurricane Center’s director says his organization would need tens of millions of dollars over the next decade for research to reduce substantially the errors in forecasting the intensity of...
P/C Insurers’ Underwriting, Investment Results Deteriorate in First Quarter
Jun 25 2008 // The U.S. property/casualty insurance industry’s net income after taxes fell to $8.2 billion in first-quarter 2008 from $16.2 billion in first-quarter 2007. Contributing to the $8 billion, or 49.3 percent, decline in...
California Firefighters Battle More Than 800 Blazes; Evacuations Ordered
Jun 24 2008 // Hundreds of wildfires sparked by lightning have flared across the heart of wine country and remote forests in Northern California, the latest batch of destructive blazes in the bone-dry state. As of Monday, June 23, 2008,...
Cat Bond Markets Resist Credit Crunch
Jun 24 2008 // Forced asset sales that have frozen major markets in the credit crisis have caused barely a ripple in the $22 billion catastrophe bond market this year and instead only enhanced its liquidity. Goldman Sachs estimates...
Update: North Carolina Wildfire Costs Reach $4.9 Million
Jun 23 2008 // The cost to fight a massive wildfire in eastern North Carolina is going up. Fire command center spokesman Dean McAlister said June 19 the costs have reached $4.9 million. Officials battling the fire in and around the...
80 Dead in Philippine Typhoon; Over 700 Missing from Stricken Ferry
Jun 23 2008 // Worried relatives wept Sunday as they awaited news of more than 740 passengers and crew aboard a ferry that capsized as Typhoon Fengshen swamped the Philippines, killing more than 80 people and submerging entire...
RMS Launches <em>Miu</em> – Cat Risk Portfolio Management Platform
Jun 23 2008 // Risk Management Solutions (RMS) has unveiled its new portfolio management platform, Miu, which supports the trading of insurance risk using RMS’ leading catastrophe risk analytics. A bulletin from RMS’ London...
HCC Forms Earthquake Division and Crime Coverage Bond Unit
Jun 23 2008 // Houston-based HCC Insurance Holdings Inc. appointed Todd Ruyak and Eric Mihailovich senior vice presidents of the company’s newly formed Professional Indemnity Agency Inc. (PIA) Property Division, reporting to PIA...
RenRe Hosts Hurricane Risk Mitigation Leadership Forum
Jun 20 2008 // Bermuda’s RenaissanceRe Holdings Ltd. marked the start of the 2008 hurricane season by holding a seminar, the first ever “Hurricane Risk Mitigation Leadership Forum”, which announced some key findings on...
BYU Professor Sets Up Disaster Education Group
Jun 20 2008 // A Brigham Young University professor feels the more people know about natural disasters, the more likely they are to survive them. Whether it’s earthquakes, hurricanes or tsunamis, professor Ron Harris says a little...
AIG Private Client Group Expands Wildfire Protection Services
Jun 19 2008 // AIG Private Client Group, a division of the personal lines property and casualty insurance subsidiaries of American International Group Inc., announced that its Wildfire Protection Unit service has doubled the number of...
Iowa Scout Camp Hit by Tornado Closes, Insurance Adjusters Tour Site
Jun 19 2008 // Officials with the Boy Scouts of America say the Little Sioux Scout Ranch in western Iowa will be closed for the summer following a deadly tornado that hit it on June 11. Four Boy Scouts were killed and nearly 50 others...
McCain, GOP Governors Split Over Disaster Fund
Jun 19 2008 // A congressional proposal to create a national “catastrophe fund” to help states recover from natural disasters has put Republican presidential hopeful John McCain at odds with a handful of GOP governors —...
Harris County Leads Texas in Number of Tornadoes
Jun 19 2008 // Harris County has had almost twice as many tornadoes reported than any other county in the state according to a recent survey conducted by the Insurance Council of Texas (ICT). Despite its location south of what is...
New Insurance Law Riling Residents of Storm Damaged Okla. Town
Jun 18 2008 // Five weeks after many of them lost their homes to a powerful tornado, Picher, Okla., residents are expressing frustration about a new state insurance law that is affecting the buyout process for residents of the polluted...
S&P: Pros And Cons of a U.S. Federal Natural Catastrophe Backstop
Jun 18 2008 // Because of a natural catastrophe’s high cost to society, some believe that the U.S. federal government should provide a program to backstop losses for natural catastrophes, said an article published by Standard...
