Moody’s RMS Event Response estimates U.S. insured losses from Hurricane Beryl to be between $2.5 billion and $4.5 billion. This includes damage from wind, storm surge, and flooding. A total of 50 fatalities have been confirmed, and preliminary damage estimates are more than $6.2 bn.
Losses to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) are projected to be under $300 million. Non-U.S. insured losses are expected to stay below $1.5 billion.
Moody’s RMS notes that most losses outside the U.S. occurred in the Caribbean, especially in Jamaica and the Windward Islands. Mexico saw minimal damage as Beryl avoided the densely populated Yucatán Peninsula.
Beryl began as a tropical depression on June 28 and quickly intensified into a Category 4 hurricane by June 30, the earliest of this strength in the Atlantic Basin.
CoreLogic’s estimates align with Moody’s RMS, predicting wind losses in Texas between $2.5 billion and $3.5 billion. Karen Clark & Company reported $510 million in Caribbean losses, $90 million in Mexico, and $2.7 billion in the U.S.
Beryl caused extensive damage across multiple regions, with the Caribbean facing long recovery times. Jeff Waters, Director of North Atlantic Hurricane Models at Moody’s, noted Beryl’s intensity and significant wind impact in Houston.
Texas building codes should reduce damage, but the area’s high population density will still result in significant minor and moderate damages.
The estimated losses include property damage, business interruption, and impacts on residential, commercial, industrial, watercraft, and automobile sectors. These estimates also account for post-event loss amplification and non-modeled losses.
In addition to wind and water damage, there were reports of fallen trees, infrastructure washouts, and tornado-related damages.
Similar to Hurricane Harvey in 2017, South Texas might experience coverage leakage from inland flooding on wind policies and litigation impacts, though to a lesser extent.
U.S. private insurance market losses will mainly be driven by wind, with storm surge and inland flooding contributing significantly in affected Texas counties with high NFIP take-up rates.
Julie Serakos, Managing Director of Product Management at Moody’s, expects primary insurers to retain most losses. Economic losses in the Caribbean might trigger parametric coverage.
Hurricane Beryl sets the stage for an active North Atlantic hurricane season. All (re)insurance market segments must prepare to respond to events using the latest Moody’s RMS modeling tools and data reflecting the current hurricane risk landscape.
Hurricane Beryl was a deadly and destructive Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that impacted parts of the Caribbean, the Yucatán Peninsula, and the Gulf Coast of the United States in late June and early July 2024.
It was the earliest-forming Category 5 hurricane on record and the second such storm in the month of July, the other being 2005’s Hurricane Emily. Beryl was also the strongest hurricane to develop within the Main Development Region (MDR) of the Atlantic before the month of July.
The second named storm, first hurricane, and first major hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season, Beryl broke many meteorological records for the months of June and July, primarily for formation and intensity.
Damage and casualties from the hurricane were widespread.
Beryl caused catastrophic damage on Grenada’s northern islands of Carriacou and Petite Martinique and on several of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines’ southern islands, such as Union Island and Canouan.
In Venezuela, six people were killed and one person missing. Sustained damage was also recorded in the Yucatán, although it was generally limited to trees, power poles, and roofs, as well as some flooding.
In the United States, the state of Texas experienced severe flooding and wind damage, with reports of at least 22 dead in the Houston region. Additionally, the outer bands of the hurricane produced a tornado outbreak, with tornadoes confirmed in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Kentucky, Indiana, New York, and Ontario.
