National Report

Workers’ compensation losses from a major earthquake could exceed those experienced in the World Trade Center disaster, according to a recent study by Risk Management Solutions, a provider of catastrophe modeling services. A repeat of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which measured 8.3, could cause as many as 78,000 injuries, 5,000 deaths, and more than $7 billion in workers’ compensation losses if it were to occur today. This compares to workers’ compensation losses of up to $5 billion resulting from the collapse of the trade center’s towers. The terrorist attacks highlighted a need for companies to consider workers’ compensation issues in disaster preparedness planning, said Peter Ulrich, managing director of enterprise risk at RMS. “The Northridge Earthquake in 1994 didn’t generate the same level of attention because there were so few workers’ compensation claims,” he explained.