European winterstorm losses creep up to €3.74 billion - Perils

Insurers lost €3.74 billion as a result of the European windstorms that buffeted the continent betweem 16 to 21 February, according to Perils’ third loss estimate.

This would make the February storms the largest European windstorm loss since Kyrill in January 2007.

The windstorm series, which struck the British Isles and Continental Europe, consisted of three storms – named Dudley, Eunice and Franklin by the UK Meteorological Office and Ylenia, Zeynep and Antonia by the Free University of Berlin,.

To compare, Perils’ latest figure – which is based on detailed loss data collected from the most affected insurers – is up €129,000 from its €3.6 billion estimate published in May 2022, three months after the event occurred.

Loss footprint

In total, nearly 1.9m individual insurance claims were filed as a result of the February storms.

Most losses occurred in Germany, followed by the Benelux states, the UK and France. Minor losses also occurred in Austria, Switzerland and Denmark. Poland and the Czech Republic were also affected but are not covered in the Perils’ loss survey.

Event definitions for reinsurance purposes not being uniform across Europe, as well as meteorological conditions and loss aggregation periods ranging from 72 to 168 hours, were also factors.