COMBINED ECONOMIC LOSSES FROM 2001 DISASTERS EXCEED $115BN

Natural and man-made catastrophes in 2001 caused more than $115bn-worth of economic loss, with the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon accounting for about $90bn of this, of which $19bn was insured, according to Swiss Re. The reinsurer said that the economic losses were the third-worst since it began keeping records in 1970 and that the terrorist attacks were easily the single largest loss from a man-made disaster, dwarfing the losses from the Piper Alpha drilling platform disaster in 1988. Swiss Re noted that billion-dollar-plus losses were also caused by the explosion of a drilling platform off the coast of Brazil and by the Code Red computer worm. The reinsurer claimed that “the trend towards higher losses continues, given the risk factors of higher population densities and higher concentrations of insured values, especially in endangered areas”.