Skip to footer

'Billion-dollar weather': The 10 most expensive US natural disasters

Here are the top 10 priciest US natural disasters in 2017 dollars adjusted for inflation, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

4. Superstorm Sandy (October 2012): $70.9 billion

Charles Sykes/AP/File
The Empire State Building and large portions of midtown Manhattan are seen without power as a result of Superstorm Sandy last October.

Sandy put a presidential election season on hold, brought the global center of finance to its knees, and literally changed the shape of the East Coast. It upended whole communities in New York and New Jersey and merged with a nor'easter to drop damaging rain and snow on six other states.

The storm caused widespread interruptions to water and electricity, leaving millions without power for days. The New York Stock Exchange closed for two consecutive business days – the first time that happened since a major winter storm in 1988. In total, Sandy cost the area $65.7 billion and caused 159 fatalities.

Sandy was an inspiration for New York City's $20 billion plan to protect against the effects of climate change. Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced the plan earlier in June and many other cities and regions across the world are considering or implementing simliar plans in anticipation of future storms.

"As bad as Sandy was, future storms could be even worse," Mr. Bloomberg said in his speech unveiling the plan. "In fact, because of rising temperatures and sea levels, even a storm that's not as large as Sandy could – down the road – be even more destructive."

7 of 10
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.