Robert Wilkey's office is a catalog of catastrophe, showcasing the swirling winds of a hurricane photographed from space, a chart listing seasonal storms and a small TV tuned to the Weather Channel.
Wilkey is head of catastrophe management at The Hartford insurance company. For the past month he's been more than focused on hurricanes Charley, Frances and Ivan.
"I guess it is obsessed," said Wilkey, a 25-year insurance industry veteran.
The insurance industry expects Charley's cost to total $6.8 billion and Frances another $4 billion. The Federal Emergency Management Agency received more than 350,000 claims for help from Florida residents battered by the two hurricanes.
And that's before Ivan, a huge storm steaming up Gulf of Mexico. The hurricane is packing winds of up to 140 mph and is responsible for at least 68 deaths in the Caribbean. Forecasters say it may strengthen before reaching landfall.
The Hartford set up offices in Orlando, Fla., and Naples, Fla., to deploy adjusters processing claims from Charley and Frances. They're now readying to do the same after Ivan passes through, though by Tuesday no one knew for certain where Ivan would hit land.
Wilkey is directing the company's operations at its Connecticut headquarters, from an office that now resembles a war room. "Logistically, it's very much like that," he said.
A potentially large area could be affected by Ivan, prompting authorities to order or strongly urge residents and tourists to evacuate coastal areas of the Florida Panhandle, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana.
The uncertainty was making work difficult for Ellen Shea, catastrophe coordinator at The Hartford. She was drawing up the logistics — hotel rooms, rental cars and the like — for claims agents moving about Florida to help victims of the storms.
"It's really tough with evacuations to get things done," she said.
On Tuesday, Wilkey and Shea were on another conference call with their people in Florida. For 25 minutes, they talked about dispatching computers, arranging hotel and motel rooms, using consultants and the potential path of Ivan.
About 300 Hartford insurance adjusters and other employees are in Florida, helping owners of homes and businesses sort through damage claims following Charley and Frances.
Each is given a global positioning system to help find their way around the disaster zones. "They've got a map, but if all the street signs are torn up, what's the good?" Wilkey asked.
The Hartford Financial Services Group, which has handled 13,000 claims from Charley and more than 9,000 claims due to Frances, has estimated its losses from Charley at $140 million. A loss estimate has not been drawn up for Frances. The company accounted for 2.4 percent of homeowners insurance in Florida in 2003.
Other insurance companies are making similar preparations. The St. Paul Travelers Insurance Co. added 350 adjusters to its Florida operations, said Ray Stone, vice president of catastrophe management for the St. Paul, Minn.-based insurer.
State Farm Insurance, which had the largest share of Florida's market at 23 percent last year, dispatched 2,500 claims adjusters in response to the hurricanes and the number is "ever changing," said spokesman Dick Luedke in Bloomington, Ill.
