hurricane irene

Hurricane Irene may end up being one of the 10 costliest catastrophes in U.S. history. Industry experts currently put the storm’s damage at $7 billion to $10 billion; however, much of that destruction may not be covered by insurance because it was caused by flooding and not winds. Flooding is often excluded from standard insurance policies.

Cleanup efforts have begun in communities that were devastated by Hurricane Irene over the weekend. Although trucks and supplies from the Federal Emergency Management Agency are en route, access to some areas has been cut off by floodwaters that washed out or damaged roads and bridges. “Irene was gonna land somewhere. We’re not Manhattan, our small streams quickly became big rivers,” Vermont Gov.

One of Hurricane Irene‘s unfortunate structural victims this weekend was the 141-year-old Bartonsville Covered Bridge in Bartonsville, Vermont.

Whenever natural disasters strike, news stations often send out a few poor saps to report from the scene. With Hurricane Irene, we typically saw wind-whipped, rain-soaked correspondents in various locations talking about the storm’s fury. But if there’s an award for Most Deserving of Hazard Pay, it has to go to Washington, DC Fox affiliate WTTG’s Tucker Barnes.