Idalia is now a hurricane with sustained winds of 80 mph and forecast to reach, at minimum, category 3 status (major hurricane) with winds of 111 - 130 mph, before making landfall:
And from the catastrophe bond - re/insurance mavens at Artemis, August 28:
As tropical storm Idalia continues to develop, the latest from the NHC forecasts a Category 3 major hurricane Idalia will approach the Florida coastline, leading BMS Senior Meteorologist Andrew Siffert to highlight the potential for any storm of this kind to be a multi-billion dollar insurance and reinsurance market loss event.
In his latest update on the development of what will be hurricane Idalia, BMS’ Siffert also cautions that Tampa is still within the forecast cone of uncertainty.“A major hurricane in any section of Florida that extends into the Southeast states is likely a multi-billion dollar insurance industry event,” Siffert explains.
Adding, “However, it is too soon to provide a narrowed loss range because there is still a 30% probability, based on the super ensemble, that Idalia could impact Tampa at this time with the metro areas still within the National Hurricane Center cone of uncertainty.
“These scenarios are pretty eye-opening, so the next 24 hours are critical as we observe what the ultimate track for Idalia will be so the industry impacts can be fine-tuned.”
As we reported this morning, Idalia is the first serious threat to Florida as well as the insurance, reinsurance, catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) industry of the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season, with the NHC forecasting the storm to reach major Category 3 sustained wind speeds....
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And August 29:
Idalia forecast to be “extremely dangerous major hurricane” for Florida
Idalia has now become a hurricane, running a little behind the forecast schedule as it meandered around Cuba, but now moving into the far southern Gulf of Mexico, the NHC warns hurricane Idalia will be an “extremely dangerous major hurricane” for Florida.
Hurricane Idalia is set to rapidly intensify right the way up to landfall, according to the NHC.
In fact, the latest forecast advisory now sees a major hurricane Idalia with sustained winds of 120 mph reaching the Gulf Coast of Florida, while gusts are expected to be approaching 150 mph as landfall nears.
The hurricane Idalia intensity forecasts from the NHC have eventually converged with what the main hurricane forecast models had been saying a few days ago, that the storm is likely to be Category 3 at least when it approaches the Panhandle region of the Florida Gulf Coast.
That’s a really significant storm, with the potential for significant property damage and loss of lives, as well as commensurate impacts to insurance, reinsurance and perhaps catastrophe bond or insurance-linked securities (ILS) interests.You can see the latest location for Idalia below, using Tomer Burg’s excellent map which shows wind speed forecasts in increments and sea surface temperatures as well, using the NHC data....*****....We’ve seen some early modelled loss projections, based on stochastic catalogue and analogue storms, which suggest anything in a range from $5 billion to as much as $20 billion, so far, depending on the exact landfall location. Some of those would require a pretty significant track-shift to take Idalia to a higher value coastal region, so we believe the market is largely working off a sub-$20bn estimate at this time.....
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And:
Hurricane Idalia not expected to significantly impact cat bonds: Plenum
