10 July 2009

Gratz on July Hurricane Damage


Over at the ICAT Damage Estimator blog Joel Gratz has an overview of historical July hurricane damage. Check out the site while you are there, it will be a hit once storms show up this year. Here is an excerpt from Joel's post:

On July 5, 1916 the “Middle Gulf Coast” hurricane made landfall near the Alabama/Mississippi border as a Category 3 storm with maximum sustained winds of 120 m.p.h. The storm surge in Mobile, AL was measured at almost 12 feet, and water inundated the entire business district. If this storm were to strike in 2009 it would cause an estimated $13.8 billion in damage – more than five times that of Dennis. This amount of damage is comparable to Hurricane Frances ($11.8 billion) that struck Florida in 2004 or Hurricane Rita ($11.3 billion) that struck Texas and Louisiana in 2005.

Some other notable July damage information:

  • $33.7 billion of all current (2009) damages occurred in the month of July. This is only 2.4% of all damages and is actually just a bit less than the month of June.
  • 20 of the 235 damaging landfalls in the U.S. since 1900 occurred in July. This is about 8.5% of landfalls.
  • Of the 20 landfalls in July, five were Tropical Storms, seven were Category 1 storms, and there were four of each Category 2 and Category 3 strength.