Over 335,000 Homes Face Risk From Tropical Storm Barry

The NOAA has forecast that Tropical Storm Barry, or possibly a Category 1 hurricane which grows out of the storm, will hit the Lousiana coast early tomorrow morning. Aside from anxiety about the risk to people in the area, primarily due to flood, a huge number of homeowners have to be worried.

Risk management firm CoreLogic reports, 339,480 Lousiana homes face what it terms “moderate-to-extreme risk” of flash flood damage. The areas affected are expected to include 12 of the 18 metropolitan and micropolitan areas in the state. The largest of the 18 are the New Orleans-Metairie, LA MSA (metropolitan statistical area) with a population of just over 1 million, the Baton Rouge, LA MSA with a population of slightly over 760,000, the Lafayette, LA MSA with a population of just over 460,000, and the Shreveport-Bossier City, LA MSA with a population of just over 425,000.

Baton Rouge, Lafayette, and New Orleans are likely to take the brunt of the financial risk from the storm in terms of the number of homes affected.

Many of the homes in the area are currently insured, based on CoreLogic’s analysis–“Within the likely impacted metro and micropolitan areas of Louisiana, 32.6% of homes are located within a Special Flood Hazard Area (SFHA). Homeowners are required to purchase flood insurance in these designated areas when their mortgages are backed by the federal government.”

The area which would have been at greatest risk before Hurricane Katrina in 2005 is the land along the Mississippi in southern Louisiana. The federal government invested approximately $14 billion primarily in the levee and pumping infrastructure to protect the area. Because Barry is not a strong storm, this construction should be more than adequate for the expected storm-driven floods.

CoreLogic models are often used to forecast and assess damage from catastrophic events, and usually issues risk analysis in anticipation of major storms. Despite what appears will be a great deal of property damage from Barry, it will not be close to the figures from the most destructive hurricanes in history.