Your home is one of your largest investments, so protecting it from natural disasters is probably one of your top priorities.
This year, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA)Climate Prediction Center expects a "near-normal" hurricane season. That means approximately 10 to 16 named storms, including four to eight hurricanes, one to four of which may be severe, between June 1 and Nov. 30.
"It is very important to note that the seasonal outlook cannot forecast where and when storms will form, let alone if/where they will make landfall and what the impacts would be," said Dennis Feltgen, public affairs officer for NOAA's National Hurricane Center. "It only takes one storm hitting your area to make it a bad year, regardless of the number of storms that are forecast in the seasonal outlook."
To figure out how to best protect homes from damage in a hurricane, theInsurance Institute for Business and Home Safety built a six-story test chamber where experts can simulate the effects of hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires and other natural disasters on full-scale one- and two-story homes, said President and CEO Julie Rochman.
Rochman and her team have tried different home fortification techniques in the test chamber to see what works, and they've developed a set of building standards called Fortified Home that they're working to implement in hurricane-vulnerable states.
