Insurance Geographics

Special Topics (narrow topic or advanced); When Hurricane Andrew slammed into the Florida coastline in August 1992, it was the crowning event in a run of more than $35 billion in catastrophe losses experienced by the property-casualty insurance industry during the preceding four years-more than the industry had experienced in the preceding two decades. The losses are staggering - and continuing. Since then, an additional $16 billion in catastrophe losses have been recorded. This comes to us together with news from hurricane observers that we are in an upswing in the danger cycle and with continued warnings from the reigning earthquake intelligentsia that its only a matter of time before The Big One hits.