Our platform provides access to normalized hurricane damage data spanning from 1900 to 2024, allowing researchers, policymakers, insurance professionals, and the public to better understand how hurricane costs have changed over time.
The core datasets used in this app are based on research by Muller et al. (2025) published in Bulletin of the American Meteorlogical Society. This study updates and refines hurricane damage normalization methodologies to provide a more accurate picture of how historical hurricanes would impact today's society.
Our platform incorporates several methodological innovations over previously used cost normalization formulas:
Browse and filter the full storm database. Use the search bar to find a storm by name, or narrow results by year range, available data types, and normalized cost or fatality thresholds. Click a row to preview storm statistics, then press Load Storm to explore it in detail.
Once a storm is loaded, four analysis tabs become available:
All storms include HURDAT2 track data. Cost normalization and fatality data are available for a subset of storms, indicated by the Cost and Fatality badges in the Storm Selector.
Normalized economic damage estimates for US landfalling hurricanes 1900-2023 using updated MMH/MMP methodology.
Yearly economic factors for GDP deflator and Current-Cost Net Stock of Fixed Assets and Consumer Durable Goods (CCNFACDG) used in the MMH/MMP cost normalization methodology.
Landfalls with identifiers, RMW county weights, and time/location data for all storms normalized using the MMH/MMP methodology.
All known direct fatalities with peril categories from tropical cyclones
County/tract level data representing the vulnerability of people in that region
We can add more here later
The datasets and methodologies in this application are grounded in peer-reviewed research. The studies below document the normalization frameworks, data sources, and analytical approaches used throughout.
Joanne Muller, Kaylee Mooney, Steven G. Bowen, Philip J. Klotzbach, Tynisha Martin, Tom J. Philp, Bhatt Dhruvkumar, Richard S. Dixon, Senthil B. Girimurugan
Since 1900, landfalling hurricanes have been the costliest of all weather-related disasters to afflict the contiguous United States. To provide a present-day (2022) reevaluation of this risk, this study employs an improved normalization approach to better understand potential economic event losses in the context of contemporary societal conditions. The updated methodology identifies impacted coastal counties using the newly available radius of maximum winds at landfall. Hurricane Katrina is the most expensive hurricane since 1900, with a likely 2022 normalized cost of $234 billion. Combined losses from the 50 most expensive hurricane events are ∼ $2.9 trillion in normalized economic losses. The study also explores some “analog storms” where comparisons can be made between two historic storms with similar landfall locations. For example, category 5 Andrew (1992) has lower 2022 normalized losses than category 4 Great Miami (1926), at $125 billion versus $178 billion, most likely due to the significantly different radius of maximum wind size (10 vs 20 n mi; 1 n mi = 1.852 km). As with previous studies, we conclude that increases in inflation, coastal population, regional wealth, and higher replacement costs remain the primary drivers of observed increases in hurricane-related damage. These upsurges are especially impactful for some coastal regions along the U.S. Gulf and Southeast Coasts that have seen exceptionally high rates of population/housing growth in comparison to countrywide growth. Exposure growth trends are likely to continue in the future and, independent of any influence of climate change on tropical cyclone behavior, are expected to result in greater hurricane-related damage costs than have been previously observed.
Joanne Muller, Abigail M. Idzik, Dylan Benzi, Philip J. Klotzbach, Heather Skaza Acosta, Daniel R. Chavas, Sebastian Aspron Urdaneta, Charles T. Gray, Jamie E. Morris, Senthil B. Girimurugan, Dhruvkumar Bhatt
Tropical cyclone (TC) fatality attribution is critical for understanding changing risk patterns, warning effectiveness, and informing emergency management strategies. Despite this, publicly available TC fatality time series data are incomplete. The last publication on TC fatalities, broken down by peril, spanned 1963–2012. To extend this record and capture more recent trends in TC mortality patterns, we present a publicly accessible fatalities database of direct continental United States TC fatalities spanning 1963–2024. We find that the leading cause of TC fatalities is freshwater flood (36%) followed by storm surge (33%). Freshwater flood fatalities are common across storms (10% of storms have >1 fatality), whereas surge fatalities are concentrated in a smaller number of high-impact events (3% of storms have >1 fatality). We also note that high fatality years tend to coincide with high seasonal Atlantic accumulated cyclone energy, with low fatality years coinciding with lower seasonal accumulated cyclone energy.
Kaylee Mooney, Joanne Muller, Philip Klotzbach, Senthil B Girimurugan, Dhruvkumar Bhatt, Steven G. Bowen, Dylan Benzi, Abigail Marie Idzik
This study presents expanded and updated normalized economic damage estimates for continental US landfalling hurricanes and tropical storms from 1900 to 2023. Here we refine our previously developed methodology by incorporating radius of maximum wind-based area weightings for population and housing unit adjustments through time. The updated methodology corrects for overestimation and underestimation issues found in previous models. Herein, two normalization paths are presented—Muller and Mooney Population and Muller and Mooney Housing—to account for changes in inflation, wealth, and population and housing unit changes, respectively. Additionally, this study extends our original 50-storm dataset to 201 storms, significantly improving the historical scope and analytical power of continental United States tropical cyclone normalized loss data. Older storms like the Great Miami Hurricane (1926) remain among the most economically damaging after 2023 normalization, surpassing even recent events such as Hurricane Katrina (2005) and Hurricane Harvey (2017). This research underscores the impact of increasing coastal exposure, emphasizing how continued population growth and development in vulnerable areas are key drivers of rising tropical cyclone-related economic losses.