Numerous storm fronts caused major damage in 2023
Published: Thursday, Dec 7th 2023, 12:40
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In 2023, a series of thunderstorm fronts caused extensive and costly damage worldwide. The USA was particularly hard hit. However, devastating thunderstorms are also occurring with increasing frequency in Europe, resulting in high costs for insurers.
In a study published on Thursday, the Swiss Re Institute estimates that catastrophes have caused economic losses of 269 billion US dollars around the globe this year. Although this was 9 percent less than in 2022, it was significantly more than the 10-year average of 235 billion.
A significant proportion of catastrophe losses is borne by the insurance industry: according to Swiss Re, an estimated 108 billion dollars of this was insured compared to 141 billion in the previous year. Natural catastrophes alone accounted for 100 billion. According to Swiss Re, this is the fourth time in a row that the 100 billion mark has been reached or exceeded.
Series of thunderstorms in the USA
What is striking: In 2023, thunderstorm fronts dominated the damage balance sheet and not hurricanes as usual. In the USA alone, thunderstorms caused insured losses of over 50 billion dollars for the first time. Swiss Re's experts counted 18 thunderstorms in the USA with costs of one billion or more each.
Thunderstorm activity was also strong in Europe this year, although not quite as pronounced as in the USA. According to the study, Italy was hit the hardest with a loss amount of over 3.3 billion dollars, after thunderstorms in France caused the highest costs on the "Old Continent" in 2022.
Hurricanes, flood disasters, forest fires and earthquakes played a minor role in 2023, even though some of these events individually caused very high losses. The earthquake in Turkey and Syria at the beginning of the year had the biggest impact on insurers' balance sheets, costing USD 6 billion. The forest fires in Hawaii (3.5 billion) and a cyclone that swept across New Zealand (2.4 billion) were also costly.
Quiet hurricane season
In contrast, the east coast of the USA, which is usually threatened by hurricanes in the second half of the year, has remained fairly quiet so far. Weather institutes had predicted an "active season" in the run-up to the hurricane season starting in summer due to the unusually high sea temperatures.
Hurricane Ian last year showed what hurricanes can do. With wind speeds of up to 240 kilometers per hour, the storm resulted in insurance claims of around 53 billion dollars. Hurricane "Katrina" from 2005 is the frontrunner with costs of almost 90 billion.
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