Natural disaster losses cost the Australian insurance industry $380 million in the last year, with the Canberra fires accounting for $312 alone. This is almost six times the amount insurers paid in 2000.

The Insurance Disaster Response Organisation (IDRO) calculates that Australian insurers have paid more than $9 billion to the victims of natural disasters since 1967. The major events that cut into the insurance industry’s pocket include the 1999 Sydney hailstorm ($1.7 billion) and the 1989 Newcastle earthquake ($1.1 billion).

IDRO National Co-ordinator Christopher Henri says many ACT fire victims “learned about the impact of underinsurance the hard way, with about one in four households unable to recover losses.”

Despite their ferocity, the Canberra fires are only rated as the eighth-worst natural disaster since 1974.