June 12, 2023
Despite a relatively average 2022 wildfire season, fears of wildfires remain at an “all-time high,” and those fears appear to be one driver of decision-making on property insurance. A new report from Gallagher Re shows the threat of damaging wildfires …
September 19, 2022
The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is funding research to better predict who wildfires spread from burning wildlands to communities. CalFire awarded Worcester Polytechnic Institute researchers Albert Simeoni and James Urban $514,981 by to develop a model to …
March 17, 2022
Increasingly large and dangerous wildfires are being driven by the effects of climate change and more building in the wildland-urban interface, and while that notion may not be entirely new, the scope of the increase laid out on Thursday by …
October 26, 2021
The global insurance industry can currently expect a long-run annual average loss of $106 billion and a greater than a 40% chance of experiencing an annual loss of more than $200 billion in the next decade, according to Boston-based modeling …
July 20, 2021
It may have been around 2017 when a true sense of urgency donned on insurers, public officials, residents and regulators in wildfire-prone California, as fires destroyed or damaged more than 10,000 structures in the state, a higher tally than the …
June 1, 2021
Wearing soot-smudged, fire-resistant clothing and helmets, several wildland firefighters armed with hoes moved through a stand of ponderosa pines as flames tore through the underbrush. The firefighters weren’t there to extinguish the fire. They had started it. The prescribed burn, …
September 1, 2020
The Colorado State Forest Service has launched a wildland-urban interface risk index. The county-by-county index uses housing density combined with modeled fire behavior to determine where the greatest potential impact to people and homes is likely to occur. The index …
August 19, 2020
New wildfire guidelines from an insurance industry home safety organization offer guidance for adapting suburban communities to the growing threat of wildfire. The Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) said its Suburban Wildfire Adaptation Roadmaps offer a detailed …
May 22, 2020
Fire-risk scores now used by insurance underwriters can sometimes can make it challenging for homeowners to find coverage. Zesty.ai, a California insurtech start-up, is among a handful of firms working to fine-tune fire-risk scores so that some homeowners have a …
September 23, 2019
Unless it’s Sunday, Kelly Loew is steering her rusty red Jeep down the same mail route in Shingletown, as she has six days a week for the last seven years. But she delivers less mail these days as California’s persistent …