extreme tropical weather. When Cyclone Seroja stormed over a 1000-kilometer area of Western Australia in April, it left a trail of destruction in its wake. The Mid West coast witnessed the worst of the devastation, with homes and businesses damaged in Kalbarri and Northampton, as well as Carnarvon’s heritage-listed One Mile Jetty.
The council’s analysis was based on industry-wide policy and claims reports from previous tropical storms in North Queensland, which resulted in a total claims of $3.83 billion. Additionally, the report contains the damage caused by the Seroja cyclone. According to Andrew Hall, chief executive of the council, the report’s major suggestion is that Australia’s national construction code should incorporate resilience in all new property development in order to mitigate the damage, loss, and disruption caused by cyclones.
Mr Hall detailed the challenges in covering the properties in cyclone-prone regions. He said, “If the severity of extreme weather events increases as predicted, it is possible some regions may become difficult to insure in the future. At present no region in Australia is uninsurable”. He further detailed the methods to implement to overcome this issue. He added, “Australia’s modern houses are not resilient to the tropical cyclone hazard of today. Implementation of stronger building codes and retrofitting programs, improved land-use planning, and permanent physical mitigation measures, where necessary, will be key to ensuring an insurable Australia.”
