When storms do damage, we go to work to make things right. Contact SERVPRO of Rapid City to start the restoration process.

7/9/2021 (Permalink)

Severe Storms Have a Costly Impact | SERVPRO® of Rapid City

What can we say about the year 2020? So much happened, but what we want to focus on is the weather—it was a record-setting year for weather and climate disasters. Of all the years in history for which we have data, 2020 was the most financially destructive.

In the year 2020, we saw 22 official weather disasters, which are defined as events that cause at least a billion dollars in damages, plus other damaging storms that are not counted in this particular statistic. There were so many tropical storms and hurricanes in 2020 that the NWS ran out of letter from the alphabet and had to dip into the Greek alphabet to finish naming all of the storms.

Not Only Hurricanes

Yes, hurricanes bring about immense destruction and causes large amounts of monetary damage, but other types of severe weather are starting to play a major role as well. In fact, the most expensive disasters of 2020 in the contiguous United States were thunderstorms and tornadoes.

In 2020, there were 14 official weather disasters that were severe thunderstorms, and some that brought tornadoes as well. Thunderstorms are common, and they don’t discriminate on where or when they will hit. And as of lately, it’s becoming quite normal to see them with the fierceness that we are seeing now.

In August 2020, what seemed like a typical line of thunderstorms in eastern Nebraska exploded into a derecho, which is something like a tornado but with straight winds instead of swirling ones, and it impacted more than 10 million acres of corn fields. This is almost half the state’s corn crops—that’s over 11% of the entire country’s corn fields.

Our summers here in Rapid City prove to be quite active, severe weather-wise! In 2020, we had nine major events happen in a three-month time span. All of which began with severe thunderstorms and progressed to hail storms or tornadoes.

Is This Our New Normal?

In 2020, it was the 10th consecutive year with at least eight billion-dollar disasters. 2018 and 2019 combined saw a total of $136 billion in damages, and 2017 caused a total cost of over $300 billion, which was the highest total on record!

Thunderstorms are normal and common, but the intensity and frequency of these are starting to become regular. So as a home or business owner, it’s imperative to take whatever precautions are possible. in order to minimize the damage to your property.

You can’t control Mother Nature no matter how many precautions you take, but you can guarantee that you have got friends in the restoration industry whose goal is to recover your valued items and restore your property "Like it never even happened."

When storms do damage, we go to work to make things right. Contact SERVPRO today to see how we can help.