Severe Storms and the Rising Associated Costs | SERVPRO of South Atlanta

7/8/2021 (Permalink)

When storms damage your home or business, we go to work to make things right. Contact SERVPRO of South Atlanta to start the restoration process ASAP.

2020 was eventful to say the least, and it was no different when it comes to weather. In fact, it was a record-setting year for climate and weather disasters.

Of all the years in history for which we have data, 2020 was the most financially destructive.

During 2020, there were 22 official weather disasters, which are defined as events that cause at least a billion dollar in damages, plus so many other damaging storms that aren’t included in the statistic.

To give you an idea of how many named storms we had, the NWS used the entire alphabet and then dipped into the Greek alphabet just to have all of the storms named.

Costs Are Steadily Going Up

Hurricanes can destroy any and everything in their path, causing immense damage and large amounts of monetary damage, but severe storms are catching up to hurricane costs. The most expensive disasters of 2020 in the contiguous United States were thunderstorms and tornadoes.

During 2020, there were 14 official weather disasters that were severe thunderstorms, and some of these brought along tornadoes as well. Thunderstorms are so common that we tend to downplay how dangerous they can really be. But they can happen at any time and at any place!

In August 2020, eastern Nebraska had what seemed to be a typical thunderstorm turn into something much more eventful called a derecho. A derecho is something like a tornado, but with straight-line winds instead of swirling ones, combined with a heavy thunderstorm.

When Nebraska had this hit, it impacted more than 10 million acres of corn fields, which is almost half the state’s corn crops—that’s over 11% of the entire country’s corn fields.

In 2020, Georgia got the remnants of Hurricane Sally and then a month later the remnants of Hurricane Delta! And as if that wasn’t enough, two weeks later, Tropical Storm Zeta affected us, too.

Not an Outlier

While it might seem like the severe weather we saw in 2020 was a rarity, the reality is different. 2020 was the 10th consecutive year that had at least eight billion-dollar disasters!

2017 saw the highest total of damages on record, with over $300 billion in damages. And then in 2018 and 2019, there was a combined total of $136 billion in damages.

Thunderstorms are becoming more intense and frequent, so as a home or business owner, it’s never too early to take whatever precautions are possible. in order to minimize the damage to your property.

Knowing the risk and taking precautions doesn’t always prevent damage, so it’s nice to know you’ve got friends in the restoration industry whose goal is to recover your valued items and restore your property “Like it never even happened.”

When storms do damage, we go to work to make things right. Contact SERVPRO today to see how we can help.