The North American hurricane season kicked off last week with warnings that insurers should brace themselves for some big storm claims.

And Lloyd’s America President Wendy Baker says it is not just US gulf coast residents that need to be concerned.

“The spectre of a hurricane hitting a major north-east population centre is hardly the stuff of Hollywood fantasy,” she told a Boston audience last week.

Repeating a warning that insurers have now been making for several months, she says residents of Boston, New York and other cities in the region would ignore the hurricane threat at their peril.

Storms like last year’s hurricanes Katrina, Wilma and Rita could cause up to $US100 billion ($133 billion) in property losses and would have the potential to wipe out up to 40 insurers.

But Ms Baker believes such events are insurable. Some insurers are calling for a taxpayer-funded pool of natural catastrophe reinsurance, but Lloyd’s says the risk market should be able to cope with most disasters. Underwriters need to factor in the effects of global warming and should be free to price their policies accordingly.

“Proposed national and state catastrophe plans risk damaging the nimbleness of capital markets and force taxpayers to underwrite repeated high-risk behaviour,” Ms Baker said.