Windstorm Babet and Aline industry loss hiked 34% to €683m by PERILS

The insurance industry loss from October’s European windstorms Babet and Aline is now estimated some 34% higher at €683 million by catastrophe data aggregator PERILS AG.

At first, back in December, PERILS had estimated these windstorms had caused an insurance industry loss of around €509 million.

The floods and storm linked to windstorms Babet and Aline affected the British Isles and northwestern Europe during the period of 18th to 22nd October 2023.

The two low pressure systems were named Babet by the UK Met Office (Viktor by the Free University of Berlin (FUB)) and Aline by the Spanish state meteorological agency (Wolfgang by the FUB).

PERILS had pegged an initial industry loss estimate of €509 million on the storms, to cover losses to the property line of business only and the firm said that the majority of the industry losses, around GBP 329 million, where in the UK.

Now, in providing its second estimate of industry losses from Babet and Aline, PERILS has raised the total by 34% to €683 million, saying these losses cover insured losses in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark and Norway.

The UK remains the source of most of the losses, at GBP 467 million, which are mainly flood-related, PERILS said.

The UK and Ireland saw flood losses dominating, while wind damage was the dominant contributor to the insurance loss in Germany, Denmark, and Norway.

Severe storm surge damage was seen in along the Baltic coast in Germany and Denmark. However, these losses are not widely covered in Germany and are not covered by the private insurance industry in Denmark, falling under its “Naturskaderådet” government scheme.

This update from PERILS comes as the UK has endured another severe windstorm in Storm Isha overnight.

Isha’s strongest winds were recorded at 99 mph and this was a particularly large and far-reaching storm, with strong winds for almost the entire country. Isha has also moved on to affect parts of northern Europe.

For the UK, with already 9 named storms this year, the season is approaching the record of 11 named windstorms set back in the 2015-16 winter season when 11 named storms formed.