Insured Losses Price Tag for Fort McMurray Wildfire Rises

August 18, 2016

Flag Of CanadaThe Fort McMurray Wildfires in Alberta in May are already Canada’s costliest ever. A new estimate now places the insured-loss priced tag even higher than previously thought.

Insured losses from property damages now surpass C$4.67 billion ($3.66 billion), according to PCS Canada, a division of the Property Claims Services unit of Verisk Insurance Solutions. That is up from C$3.58 billion ($276 billion) in insured losses as estimated by the Insurance Bureau of Canada in July and reported by Reuters.

The PCS Canada number is based on 25,200 personal claims, 5,300 commercial claims and 8,400 auto claims.

On May 3, Fort McMurray faced a wildfire that forced the whole city to be evacuated. Including the city, close to 90,000 people in Northern Alberta were evacuated, and the fires burned more than 1.4 million acres by the end of May.

As Reuters reported, the losses already exceed those caused by the Alberta floods of 2013, which cost approximately C$1.7 billion in claims ($1.33 billion).

Source: PCS Canada/Verisk