Hurricane Frances is expected to be less costly for insurers than feared, though high winds and flooding generated billions of dollars in damage in Florida and brought the state to a virtual standstill during a three-day holiday weekend.
About 2 million Florida residents did not have electricity early Monday afternoon, as the state’s biggest utilities began the long job of restoring service. Airlines, hotels and theme parks were just starting to resume business, while retailers stocked up for the massive clean-up ahead.
Risk Management Solutions, a Newark, California, firm that estimates insurance damages caused by storms, said it now expects insured property losses of $3 billion to $6 billion, compared with its previous $2 billion to $10 billion forecast.
“We expect losses to be less than that experienced with (Hurricane) Charley,” said Kyle Beatty, an RMS meteorologist.
Last month, Hurricane Charley struck Florida’s west coast with 145 mile-per-hour winds and streaked across the state, leaving $6.8 billion of insured property losses in its wake. Frances covered about 20,000 square miles -- three times the area as Charley -- but packed winds of 105 mph that lost speed as it slogged toward the state’s Gulf coast.
The slow-moving storm caused heavy flooding. But flood damage is largely covered by the National Flood Insurance program, part of the U.S. government’s Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“We’re breathing a sigh of relief,” said Loretta Worters, a spokeswoman for the Insurance Information Institute, a property and casualty industry trade group. “This was not the ’storm of the century’ everybody seemed to claim it would be.”
Actual damage from Frances, which was downgraded to a category 2 hurricane when it made landfall Saturday and slowed further to a tropical storm as it crossed the state, will not be fully assessed until the end of this week, she said.
Hurricane Andrew, a category 5 storm that struck Florida in 1992, resulted in $15.5 billion in insurance claims, or about $20 billion in today’s dollars. Charley, meanwhile, generated $6.8 billion of claims, Worters said.
Category 5 hurricanes pack winds in excess of 155 miles per hour, while category 2 storms have winds of 96 to 110 mph.
Lost weekend
For businesses, Frances arrived at the onset of the Labor Day weekend and then was slow to depart, spoiling a major summer holiday for the state’s enormous tourism trade.
Walt Disney Co., owner of the sprawling Walt Disney World resort in Orlando, said it reopened the gates to its Magic Kingdom and Epcot Center parks Monday after finding only minimal damage.
The storm also put a stop to shopping in the country’s fourth-largest state with more than 17 million people.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the largest U.S. retailer, earlier Monday said the storm had a “negative impact” on sales in the region, though it expected customers to flock to its stores as they tackled the job of cleaning up.
Another retailer expecting a rush of customers was Home Depot Inc.. The home improvement chain said almost all of its Florida stores had reopened for business, while as many as 1,000 trucks headed to Florida bringing supplies to meet the expected demand for clean-up materials, bottled water and barbecue grills.
“It’s the largest resupply mission in the history of this company,” said spokesman Don Harrison.
Lowe’s Companies Inc., a rival home improvement chain, said all but one of its 65 stores had reopened though 44 stores were closed at some point over the weekend. The company suffered some damage at its Florida east coast locations, mainly in its outdoor garden centers, spokeswoman Chris Ahearn said.
Like Home Depot, Lowe’s said it expected a big pick up in sales of generators, tarps and other post-storm supplies. Last week the company shipped 15,000 generators to its Florida stores and added 1,200 more this past weekend.
Airlines also started to resume flights as Frances moved out. JetBlue and AirTran Holdings Inc. said they would be operating at their full schedules to Florida by Monday afternoon.
With skies finally clearing, Florida’s power utilities scrambled to restore service.
Florida Light & Power, a unit of FPL Group Inc. and Florida’s largest utility with 4.2 million customers, said it restored service to 1 million homes but still had 1.7 million customers without power.
A spokeswoman said 6,000 crew members, plus another 6,000 contractors and workers from other utilities, were reporting to staging areas throughout the state to begin restoration work.
TECO Energy Inc.’s Tampa Electric said it restored 156,000 customers Sunday night, leaving 194,000 without power.
Progress Energy Florida, a unit of Progress Energy Inc., said 600,000 customers still did not have power late Monday morning. Georgia Power, part of Southern Co.. said 14,000 Florida customers were without power.
