The frequency and intensity of “elevated storms” in the US is expected to continue for at least five years.
Risk Management Solutions (RMS) said that increases to hurricane landfall frequencies in the company's US hurricane model will increase modeled annualised insurance losses by 40% on average across the Gulf Coast, Florida and the Southeast.
The company also revealed that it expects an increase of 25-30% in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast coastal regions, relative to those derived using long-term 1900-2005 historical average hurricane frequencies.
To address this period of elevated frequency and intensity of storms, the world's leading provider of products and services for catastrophe risk management has consulted with representatives from all segments of the insurance industry and updated its US and Caribbean hurricane models to provide a 'medium-term' (five-year) forward-looking view of risk for estimating potential catastrophe losses.
To date, catastrophe model results have been based on a long-term historical average baseline.
Dr. Robert Muir-Wood, chief research officer at RMS, said: "While the experts convened by RMS hold different climatological perspectives on the underlying causes of elevated hurricane activity, they agreed unanimously that a forward-looking view of risk should reflect a higher probability of land-falling hurricanes than is represented by long-term historical averages."
RMS said the increased frequency and intensity of hurricane activity in the Atlantic Ocean Basin, as observed since 1995, were driven by higher sea surface temperatures in the tropical North Atlantic and by associated changes in atmospheric circulation.
According to the company these warmer temperatures are expected to translate into a continuation of high activity in the basin, leading to a greater potential for hurricanes to make landfall at higher intensities over the next five years.
