NU Online News Service, May 25, 2:59 p.m. EDT
State Farm spokesman John Wiscaver has been with the company for 23 years and calls the damage caused by a tornado in Joplin, Mo., “as bad as I have ever seen.”
He adds, “The damage is significant. You look at the severity—buildings made of steel twisted and flattened to the ground.”
State Farm has sent substantial resources and supplies to the area, as it expects thousands of home and automobile claims. The city of about 50,000 residents lost homes, a hospital, a school, police and fire departments, and large stores along a commercial strip, Wiscaver adds.
More than 120 people died, making the May 22 tornado the deadliest in more than 60 years. Catastrophe risk modeling firm EQECAT says insured losses for the Joplin tornado could be between $1 billion and $3 billion.
Paul Crosetti, Missouri executive director for Farmers Insurance, says the damage is “unbelievable.”
“The amount of destruction…as far as you can see…it’s heart-wrenching,” he says from the company’s mobile claims center in Joplin. “Tornadoes are just very violent in the way they cause damage.”
“The emotional toll it must take to lose everything—I can only imagine,” he adds. “We’re here to try to make things a little easier.”
Farmers was just receiving word that the National Weather Service was issuing a tornado warning for Kansas City. Thousands of Farmers employees work in the city.
“We’re trying to keep up with the reports to stay ahead, but it is definitely a challenge,” Crosetti says. “We’re always trying to figure out how we will handle additional claims volumes if we need to. We’re always asking the question.”
While Farmers issues advances on living expenses with debit cards (“Some folks have no way to cash a check right now,” Crosetti says), the company is sending other mobile claims vehicles to Oklahoma City, Okla., to deal with tornadoes that struck May 24.
Wiscaver says the tornadoes in Oklahoma struck more rural-type areas.
“From a claims-numbers standpoint it won’t be a significant event, but it is to the families that did lose their homes,” Wiscaver says. “We’ll be there to help them.”
Additional claims will be filed in Texas, where the storm system pounded the Dallas/Fort Worth area with hail the size of baseballs, reports the Insurance Council of Texas (ICT).
Spokesman Mark Hanna advises policyholders to get in claims as soon as possible since agents “are being deluged with claims.” ICT’s sources at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport say the hail grounded at least 65 planes and caused heavy damage to dozens of taxis.
State Farm is the top writer of personal-lines insurance in Missouri and Oklahoma, according to Highline Data. Farmers, part of the Zurich Insurance Group, is second largest provider of personal lines in Oklahoma and the third largest in Missouri.
Highline Data is a part of Summit Business Media, which also owns National Underwriter.
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