WASHINGTON, Sept 2: Economic losses from Hurricane Katrina’s deadly carnage could top 100 billion dollars, forecasters said on Friday as oil and port operators battled to resume operations battered by the terrifying storm. Risk Management Solutions said at least half the losses are expected to come from flooding in New Orleans, wind damage and coastal surges, tattered infrastructure and indirect economic effects.

The RMS, a consultant for the insurance and finance industries, said the New Orleans disaster ‘has developed into the most damaging flood in US history’, with at least 150,000 properties inundated.

The 100-billion-dollar figure would dwarf previous natural disasters in the United States, forecasters said, and could rival losses from the Sept 11, 2001, attacks.

In terms of insurance losses alone, industry forecasters have said Katrina could entail payouts of at least 25 billion dollars.

But RMS said those forecasts did not take into account the mammoth costs of rebuilding New Orleans, much of which is now a swimming pool after levees protecting the city from a lake and the Mississippi River collapsed.

Hurricane Andrew caused insurance losses of about 21 billion dollars in today’s prices when it swept through the southeastern United States in 1992. Its damage was far less sweeping than Katrina’s.

In contrast, insurance losses from the September 11 attacks have been put at more than 20 billion dollars.

Katrina has been so devastating because aside from levelling New Orleans and the surrounding area, it affected major oil refineries, ports, pipelines and highways connecting the region to the rest of the country.

“This is far and away off the charts in terms of other natural disasters,” Global Insight spokesman Jim Dorsey said.

“9/11 saw some of the most valuable real estate in the world destroyed but we’re still not sure what the total impact has been,” he said.

Global Insight believes insured losses from Katrina will top 25 billion dollars.

“But a lot of folks down there are uninsured so it’s conceivable that the real loss figure could double or triple to upwards of 75 billion,” Dorsey said.

“Then with the total impact thrown in, the figure for damages should be much higher than that.”

Katrina’s fury has had a direct impact already on petrol pump prices across the United States, with gasoline now topping three dollars a gallon in many areas.

—AFP