AccuWeather's Jon Porter reports preliminary estimates totaling between $14 and $17 billion in damages and economic loss due to the historic winter storm that swept through the Southern states.
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00:00John, thank you so much for taking some time to talk with us about this historic storm.
00:05And even with the numbers behind you, it's historic when it comes to how much we've lost
00:11in terms of economic losses, too. Yeah, there was a big impact there. Of course,
00:16this storm was notable in so many ways from a historic context, as you and Bernie were talking
00:22about, but also caused damage and significant disruption to commerce and to businesses and
00:29everyday life. AccuWeather estimates preliminarily $14 to $17 billion in total damage and economic
00:37loss from the snow, the ice, and the extreme cold and all those impacts. And what we always like to
00:43do is put that estimate for total damage and economic loss, which is a more holistic estimate
00:49than is available from any other source. We like to put it into context with recent disasters. And
00:54you can see the $14 to $17 billion here, far under the $250 to $275 billion from the California
01:02wildfires just in recent weeks, and also far under the Texas and eastern U.S. deep freeze from 2021,
01:11which AccuWeather estimated total damage is economic loss of $155 billion. So about 10 times
01:18less on this most recent cold wave, but a very significant one. And, Bri, one of the reasons
01:22that that number is as high as it is, is we were talking about significant delays and closures
01:29across Interstate 10 from Houston to New Orleans, east to the Florida Panhandle, a major thoroughfare
01:36of commerce across the Gulf Coast. And, of course, big cities shut down, not for one day, but
01:43effectively multiple days, as they're going to continue to deal with this, the impacts of the
01:47snow and ice and extreme cold. And you can see why here, John. We had plenty of snow. It was hard.
01:55You couldn't even get to the airport, which is why they did have to shut down. Here are some of the
02:00highest totals that we did see. Very significant for this part of the country. Of course, in this,
02:06near the Gulf Coast, even an inch of snow is significant to so to have almost a foot of snow
02:11in some locations. This is one that people could live in this area for their entire lives
02:17and not see a storm like this. And, you know, talking about the snow along the Gulf Coast,
02:23it wasn't just the Gulf Coast. It really extended along the east coast of the U.S. as well. It did.
02:29And we were talking about this all day yesterday here with our snow experts on the AccuWeather
02:34Network, that as the storm pulled to the east, there'd be more sleet and freezing rain concerns
02:39in the Jacksonville to Savannah area, but then up on the Carolina coastline, another area where there
02:45could be three to six inches of snow right along the coast. And so once again, some of those
02:50beautiful pictures that you just showed out of Myrtle Beach there, where you have snow accumulating
02:54right at the beach. It's so rare in this part of the country. Yeah. And you know, John, speaking of
03:00how rare it is, we broke records across a lot of the Gulf Coast. He does break this number down
03:06really quickly. In New Orleans, for example, there was three inches of snow that occurred in just two
03:12hours, which is a very impressive feat. If you look at some of the other significant snows in
03:17the New Orleans area over the last 50 or 60 years, that might have been two point seven inches of
03:23snow. So we had more than that in just two hours. So those snow totals of eight to 10 inches of snow
03:30across the New Orleans area, a truly historic storm not seen since the big snowstorm there in
03:361895. You have to go all the way back to 1895 to find similar snow totals in the New Orleans area.
03:43And remember, people in that area are going to be dealing with these impacts here for days
03:47because it's going to take a lot to get rid of all of that snow and ice from the roadways.
03:52Wow. You know what it means when we say a once in a lifetime storm. AccuWeather chief meteorologist
03:58John Porter, thank you so much for breaking down some of those numbers for us and breaking down
04:03this very rare storm.