As if it were yesterday, I vividly remember going to my first catastrophic fire loss with my dad at the young age of nine. It was a house fire in Sarasota involving a resident falling asleep with a lit cigarette. The amount of damage that was caused by the fire was permanently implanted in my mind. Recently, Hurricane Helene brought me back to that memory, as the storm surge and flooding caused so much devastation to my beautiful hometown of Sarasota. A hurricane whose eye was more than 100 miles off the coast of Florida brought unprecedented storm surge and flooding.
Fisherman’s Cove condos after Helene’s storm surge. The white cubes are roofing material. The property was just starting a roof replacement when the storm hit. (drone photo by Matt Mercier)
Even weeks after the fact, my mind is still blown by the amount of catastrophic damage this storm caused.
According to CoreLogic, the insured flood losses from the National Flood Insurance Program