U.S. Skirts Another Category 5

When Hurricane Dean rolled through the Caribbean and crashed into the Yucatan Peninsula in mid-August, it caused close to $2 billion in insured damages and marked the first time a Category 5 hurricane had made landfall since 1992, the year when Hurricane Andrew devastated Florida.

Instead of waiting another 15 years, however, the world had only to wait two weeks before another Category 5 storm made landfall. Hurricane Felix struck the Honduran/Nicaraguan coastline recently with winds reaching 160 mph, albeit in a swampy and sparsely populated portion of the country. According to ReAdvisory, the storm was tightly packed when it reached the coastline, which helped limit the breadth of the damage. Felix is expected to dissipate over the next three days in the mountains of Central America. A report issued by RMS estimates insured losses will be less than $200 million, a number that will not accurately reflect the extent of the damages due mostly to the fact that insurance take-up in the region is not very high.