Florida
Hurricane
Emergency
Response
Effort
Charley, Frances, Ivan, Jeanne. Not a school
roll
call, but the names of four of the most devastating
hurricanes to strike Florida in more than a
century. In less than six weeks, the hurricanes'
deadly path
caused untold heartache and damages now estimated
in
the tens of billions of dollars. Two of the
hurricanes, Frances and Jeanne, both struck
land within
five
miles of
each other, something that has never happened
before.
A hurricane emergency response team
of more than 100
from MACTEC, Inc. based in Atlanta, Ga.,
responded immediately to urgent requests from
a wide
variety of public
and private sector clients statewide. Tasks
ranged from providing
structural, roofing, water intrusion and
stormwater damage assessments to asbestos sampling
and
remediation.
Editor's Note: Following
a devastating hurricane season, insurance
companies are expected to pay over two million
claims to
customers whose property was damaged or destroyed,
according
to the Insurance Information Institute (I.I.I.).
The I.I.I. also
reports that more than one out of every five
Florida homes has
been damaged by a hurricane this year. Insurance
claims from
the four storms will total nearly $23 billion,
exceeding the
$15.5 billion record set by Hurricane Andrew
in 1992.
"The number of claims insurance
companies are paying is
equivalent to the entire population of the
Tampa-St. Petersburg
metropolitan area," said William E. Bailey,
director of the
Hurricane Insurance Information Center in Punta
Gorda, Fla.
C&R will periodically present
updates of the ongoing work in
Florida as different restoration companies
share their experiences.
