Hurricane Michael destroyed their homes Then the insurance heartache began.

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• Why did so many concrete block homes collapse in Mexico Beach during Hurricane Michael?
• 3 Million Homes at Risk of Hurricane Storm Surge in U.S., According to Annual Report
• Popular in the Community
• Henrietta Lacks' hometown building her statue where Robert E. Lee sculpture once was
• ABC News
• Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss left suicide note alluding …

County leaders are in talks with private builders to construct new affordable housing quickly through nontraditional means such as 3-D printing, modular construction and tiny houses. County officials also said they had seen a disturbing amount of domestic violence cases but did not provide details immediately.

More than 900,000 homes and businesses in Florida, Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas have been left without power. Several thousands National Guard troops, law enforcement officers and medical teams have been deployed in the recovery effort. He called Boggs, the St. Petersburg lawyer who he had seen posting advice in a Facebook group for people with insurance questions after Michael. And he reached out to his neighbor, with whom he shared a wall, to find out how much Frontline paid for a claim on a policy Champion believed was very similar to his own. He learned that after a lawyer got involved, the neighbor’s wind payment reached more than $285,000, more than 20 times what Frontline offered Champion.

Why did so many concrete block homes collapse in Mexico Beach during Hurricane Michael?

"The road to recovery is long, arduous and it happens, it just takes time, especially when you want to do it right," Baber said. "We're back, we're humming right now. ... We still offer the self service that a small city should offer, as we continue to grow and add new and exciting things for the residents and tourists alike." One resident forced to run that race is the Rev. Eddie LaFountain of First Baptist Church of Mexico Beach. The church's campus still was an active construction site Monday as crews worked to repair damages caused by Michael.

Several colleges and universities in south Georgia were to close for a few days. Atlanta Motor Speedway opened their campgrounds free of charge to evacuees of Hurricane Michael. One of the county’s two hospitals, heavily damaged by the storm, has only about a quarter of the beds it did before. “We are in the midst of a mental health crisis here in Bay County,” school district officials concluded in a report. That’s both the population of Puerto Rico and the number of people currently without power.

3 Million Homes at Risk of Hurricane Storm Surge in U.S., According to Annual Report

If another hurricane comes, he expects to have the same flood insurer, the only one he knows offering coverage on his narrow shoreline. “Without them, you’re just one little guy trying to fight with Lloyd’s of London,” he said, referring to the behemoth overseas insurance market, which holds his residential flood policy. Delo said he has heard of field adjusters having their valuations reduced by desk adjusters who make recommendations without even visiting a property.

The town of 1,200 people was largely leveled, as it was hit by 155 miles an hour winds and a storm surge of 9 feet (2.7 meters) from the category 4 hurricane. In the province of Pinar del Río, 300 people were evacuated to the homes of neighbors or relatives. In the province of Artemisa, particularly in the areas of Playa de Majana and the towns of Cajio and Guanimar, which are prone to coastal flooding, evacuations were carried out, but the number of evacuees were unknown. A national response plan was carried out and alert as well as evacuation phases were being fulfilled as well. In western Cuba, a hurricane warning was issued 10 hours before the center passed over Cabo del San Antonio. A large area of disturbed weather spawned over the mid-to-western Caribbean Sea around October 1–2, 2018, and absorbed the remnants of Tropical Storm Kirk.

Popular in the Community

"We had houses that were on one side of the street and now they're on the other," said Mexico Beach Mayor Bo Patterson. "So many lives have been changed forever," state Governor Rick Scott said. "So many families have lost everything. ... This hurricane was an absolute monster." Hurricane Michael left the US state of Florida battered and bruised on Thursday, as search-and-rescue teams set to work. “Ninety percent of the buildings are gone and then you’re dealing with this insurance company that won’t even respond to you, and then when they do respond to you, it’s a joke,” Champion said.

Their wind insurer offered $16,000 for a new metal roof, which would also need repairs to the trusses and framework underneath. Cook said over time the houses have become hazardous to the community. Georgia Governor Nathan Deal declared a state of emergency for 92 counties in the southern and central portions of the state on October 9.

The storm was referred to as a “wake-up call” to building officials at the time. The Panhandle has not been required to meet the same "wind-borne debris” standards instituted for South Florida up until now, but will likely be upgraded to tougher standards soon. With sustained winds of 155 mph and a storm surge of up to 14 feet, Hurricane Michael is one of the strongest storms to ever make landfall in the U.S. “Typically you have the strongest wind speeds come first, and then the storm surge follows it,” Merlin said. But residents and their attorneys, he said, may need to pay meteorologists and engineers to prove that flood and wind are to blame, and how much. Across the Panhandle, from Panama City to Port St. Joe, north through Blountstown and into Marianna, residents are battling insurance companies.

The estimated cost to rebuild if every vulnerable home in Miami was destroyed would be $166 billion. In the New York City metropolitan area, the price tag could be as high as $330 billion. Virgin Islands and losses sustained by private insurers and government-sponsored programs such as the National Flood Insurance Program. The chart below shows insured losses in dollars for the top 10 costliest hurricanes in the United States when they occurred and in 2021 dollars, adjusted for inflation. According to Aon, Katrina was the costliest hurricane on record, causing $65 billion in insured losses when it occurred in 2005, including losses from the NFIP.

Henrietta Lacks' hometown building her statue where Robert E. Lee sculpture once was

Several insurance companies declined or did not respond to requests for comment for this story. Such cases are sometimes signaled by Civil Remedy Notices filed with the state, which put carriers on the clock to respond to demands for fair payment. Lawyers call the insurers greedy, driven by bottom lines instead of moral centers. They track stories of clients offered just a few thousand dollars, only to receive tens or hundreds of thousands more when they use legal letterhead. Billboards advertise law firms and public adjusters along U.S. 98 from Port St. Joe into Mexico Beach as the disaster economy churns.

Boats from the marina were forced inland onto a parking lot 300 yd from the docks. The failure of 15pumping stations hamstrung the city's ability to eliminate wastewater. Power lines and crumpled amalgamations of cars lay strewn across roads.

Dorian is then projected to move towards the Georgia and South Carolina coasts on Wednesday evening and Thursday. “Although gradual weakening is forecast, Dorian is expected to remain a powerful hurricane during the next couple of days,” the National Hurricane Center stated. On Sunday, President Trump wrongly claimed that Alabama was in Dorian's path and said he had “never even heard of a category 5 storm”—a sentiment he has repeated at least four times previously. His flood carrier paid about $135,000, enough for Champion to start thinking about rebuilding. A representative from Frontline, the wind insurer, called and asked for his address in November to send his checks. This picture shows what remains of Bill and Lisa Champion’s vacation home in Mexico Beach after Hurricane Michael.

In August, Florida first lady Casey DeSantis announced the installation of 63 “telehealth” kiosks where students in public schools that were affected by the hurricane can speak to a mental health professional remotely. The abandoned white Hyundai Elantra was found in Eugene, Oregon, another college town that's nearly 500 miles away from Moscow, Idaho. The amount of damage already inflicted on Puerto Rico by Hurricane Irma, which skirted the island just two weeks ago. The amount of debt the economically troubled U.S. territory had before the storm, not including an additional $50 billion in pension liabilities. Cars drive through a flooded road in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in San Juan on Sept. 21, 2017.

"When you get 80% of your homes damaged, and as many as we had that were completely demolished, it's very hard to reset," Baber said. "It does take quite a while and a lot of planning, a lot of money, and then a lot of back and forth on how to do things better and make stronger so we're not in this situation again. Four years later, the beach community is an active construction zone that doesn't resemble at all their pre-Michael community. Immediately following the hurricane, the city of Mexico Beach issued a 90-day moratorium on new construction in order to keep focus on on clean up.