Hurricane Francine expected to cost insurers $1.5 billion

After making landfall as a Category 2 storm, Hurricane Francine is estimated to have done around $1.5 billion worth of damage across its path of destruction in Louisiana and Mississippi.

That estimate comes from Karen Clark & Company, a catastrophe modeling firm.

Francine contained wind gusts that registered as high as 100 miles per hour and knocked out power in over 400,000 homes.

And the losses could have been much, much worse: Francine had been downgraded to a tropical storm by the time she passed over the major population center of New Orleans.

Francine was the sixth hurricane to cause major damage in Louisiana in the last five years and the third hurricane to affect the contiguous United States in 2024.

The estimate took into account expected private insurance payouts for damages caused to residential, commercial and industrial properties as well as automobiles and business interruption. It did not included damage to boats, offshore properties, or any losses insured through the National Flood Insurance Program.