Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Climate Exodus: Movement of the People

I’ve got love and assurance, I’ve got new [property] insurance
And I’ve got strength and endurance, so I count my blessings.
-Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley, Count Your Blessings

In 1955, the island community of Isle de Jean Charles, some 80 miles south of New Orleans, covered 22,000 acres. Since then, rising water levels and subsiding land have shrunk the island every year. Inch by inch and acre by acre, the surrounding marshes have claimed most of the island’s grassland and forests, so that today only about 450 acres remain. 

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Wednesday, October 9, 2019

New Space Offers New Solutions for Insurers Looking to Better Assess Exposure

One of the biggest issues facing CAT insurers is assessing risk in an uncertain future. As catastrophic storms increase in number and intensity, CAT insurers must prepare accordingly. Specifically, the increasing number and intensity of hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico require insurers to find innovative ways to assess risk and address underwriting challenges. Over the past thirty years, insurers have been forced to adapt policies to fit the changing world. This has included the development of new or different exclusions and deductibles. 

Thursday, September 26, 2019

Revised Predictions Forecasting A More Active Atlantic Hurricane Season Are Coming To Fruition

The 2019 Atlantic hurricane season officially began on June 1 and runs through November 30, although Subtropical Storm Andrew made 2019 the fifth consecutive year to have a named storm form outside of that time frame. The Atlantic season includes the Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean Sea.

Monday, September 9, 2019

Hurricane Dorian Claims: Spotlight On Independent Adjusters’ Liability

After devastating the Bahamas, Hurricane Dorian has moved up the Atlantic Coast and is now affecting the Canadian Maritimes. Dorian was the fifth Atlantic hurricane to reach Category Five status in four years and has already broken records with sustained wind speeds exceeding 185 miles per hour. Many are attributing Dorian’s strength and fury to climate change. Although Dorian was ultimately downgraded - it is now a Category 1 after impacting the Carolinas as a Category 2/3 - it has had wide-reaching impacts along the Eastern Seaboard, and early estimates suggest the cleanup and repairs will cost tens of billions of dollars.

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Friday, August 30, 2019

Governor Extends State Emergency in Florida in Advance of Hurricane Dorian

On August 29, 2019, Governor Rick DeSantis issued Executive Order number 19-190 that extended the state of emergency in Florida to cover every county in the state. Hurricane Dorian is now predicted to be a Category 4 hurricane when it makes landfall in Florida sometime this weekend. If that prediction is accurate, it would be the most powerful hurricane to strike the East Coast of Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Early predictions paint a potential insurance exposure that could approach $145 Billion. As with Hurricane Michael which struck the panhandle of Florida in October of 2018, our previous discussions related to business interruption and concurrent causation in Florida may be relevant to claims that arise from Hurricane Dorian.

Thursday, August 29, 2019

Hurricane Dorian Approaches Florida

Hurricane Dorian is now predicted to strike Florida’s East Coast as a possible Category 3 hurricane. On August 28, 2019, Governor Rick DeSantis issued Executive Order number 19-189 declaring a state of emergency in a number of counties along the east coast. Attached is a checklist that provides some information for carriers that may be facing claims in Florida from Dorian.

Posted by William Zieden-Weber and Christine Renella

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

New Florida Case Alert: Retained Public Adjuster Was Not “Disinterested” Appraiser

First-party property policies typically include appraisal provisions requiring each party to appoint a “disinterested” or “impartial” appraiser. A Florida appellate court recently addressed the question of what makes a potential appraiser “disinterested” in a case involving a Hurricane Irma claim.

Monday, July 22, 2019

Zelle CAT-Law Webinar Week Continues

Managing Insurance Claims in the Wake of Catastrophes
July 23-26, 2019

Zelle LLP invites you to join us for a week of webinars featuring insurance topics that are of critical importance to adjusters and insurance professionals. This series will cover managing insurance claims in the wake of catastrophes. All webinars will be offered free of charge and 1.0 of CE credit will be offered to attendees. These courses have been approved for CE credit in the following states: Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, and Wyoming.

Tuesday, June 18, 2019

Zelle Hosts CAT-Law Webinar Week

Managing Insurance Claims in the Wake of Catastrophes
July 22-26, 2019

Zelle LLP invites you to join us for a week of webinars featuring insurance topics that are of critical importance to adjusters and insurance professionals. This series will cover managing insurance claims in the wake of catastrophes. All webinars will be offered free of charge and 1.0 of CE credit will be offered to attendees. These courses have been approved for CE credit in the following states: Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, and Wyoming.

Thursday, June 13, 2019

Latest Arkansas Floods Will Test The Already Vulnerable National Flood Insurance Program

President Trump recently declared the flooding throughout the Gulf Coast a National Emergency and pledged federal resources, including FEMA, to assist with the recovery efforts. All the while, one of the linchpins in flood-related national disaster preparedness – the National Flood Insurance Program (“NFIP”) – faces a disaster of its own.

Wednesday, May 29, 2019

Texas Legislature Passes Two Important Bills Prohibiting Waiving of Deductibles and Expanding UPPA Prohibition to all Contractors

The 86th Texas Legislative Session came to an end over the weekend. We are pleased to report that the Texas Legislature passed two very important bills that we have worked on for many months.

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Tuesday, May 28, 2019

Puerto Rico’s New Requirements for Property Insurers: Financial Reviews & Disaster Response Planning

In response to the extremely active 2017 Atlantic hurricane season, the governor of Puerto Rico enacted several bills that amend or introduce new provisions to the Insurance Code of Puerto Rico, 26 L.P.R.A. § 101 et seq., including provisions regarding additional civil remedies against insurers, as well as new requirements for insurers, surplus carriers, and micro-insurance providers.

Wednesday, May 8, 2019

The Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018 intends to increase disaster preparedness

As referenced in our recent CAT-Law post on the Catastrophic Losses of 2018, at the end of 2018 Congress passed the Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018 (DRRA) in an effort to improve the nation’s overall capacity to respond to large-scale disasters. The DRRA reflects lawmakers’ concern that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) alone was ill-equipped to respond to large-scale disasters, which appear to be occurring with increasing frequency and severity since Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Notably, 2017 and 2018 brought Hurricanes Harvey, Maria, and Irma in rapid succession, as well as massive wildfires in California and elsewhere.

Wednesday, May 1, 2019

Puerto Rico’s Newly Required Expedited Payment Process for Property Insurance Policies

In our recent article addressing property insurance in Puerto Rico, we discussed the new appraisal rules for Puerto Rico property insurers that the governor of Puerto Rico enacted in response to the extremely active 2017 Atlantic hurricane season. The governor also enacted five other bills that amend or introduce new provisions to the Insurance Code of Puerto Rico, 26 L.P.R.A. § 101 et seq., including provisions regarding expedited payment requirements, additional civil remedies against insurers, as well as new requirements for insurers, surplus carriers, and micro-insurance providers.

Wednesday, April 10, 2019

The Catastrophic Losses of 2018

Last year, the United States experienced the top three largest natural catastrophes in the world with overall losses. The three most significant events were the California Wildfire, Hurricane Michael, and Hurricane Florence. The United States sustained 14 significant weather- and climate-related disaster events in 2018. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (“NOAA”), the overall damage from weather-related catastrophes and climate disasters reached approximately $91 billion.

Wednesday, March 27, 2019

Cyclone Idai Highlights Insurance Needs and Opportunities in Developing Economies

When Cyclone Idai made landfall in the east African countries of Mozambique, Madagascar, Malawi, and Zimbabwe earlier this month, it claimed hundreds of lives, cut off electrical power to millions, damaged or destroyed schools, hospitals, and businesses, and drove innumerable families from their homes. Flooding nearly submerged Mozambique’s fourth-largest city, Beira, a port that serves as a gateway to inland areas of Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and Malawi. The damage is so severe and widespread that Idai ranks among the most devastating cyclones in history.

Thursday, February 28, 2019

The Return of the Bomb Cyclone

A year after a series of “bomb cyclones” struck the United States as reported by my partner Seth Jackson last year, the “bomb cyclone” is back in the news as part of large winter storm that wreaked havoc across the United States earlier this week. As a result of the most recent “bomb cyclone,” it was reported that nearly 650,000 people were without power and more than 80 million people were under high wind advisories.

Wednesday, February 20, 2019

New Lessons from Oroville

Climate Change Creates Evolving Risks for Dam and Reservoir Systems


Two years ago this month, communities along California’s Feather River braced for the worst when the primary spillway at the Oroville Dam failed, and rising waters in the Oroville Reservoir overtopped the dam’s emergency spillway. Catastrophic failure was averted, but in the wake of that crisis, my colleague Dan Millea and other experts urged that the near miss should be a wake-up call about the need to inspect other dams to detect risks of similar failures. At the same time, climatologists speculated about how climate change may have contributed to the incident. Two years later, there is still no precise answer to that question, but experts agree that climate change is altering the environmental stresses for which dams have been designed in the past. Today we urge insurers to consider how climate change creates new and evolving risks to dams and reservoir systems, and the potential impact on the risks they insure.

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