Montecito residents who are hoping that insurance will cover damage to their homes from recent mudslides received a word of support from an important ally on Monday.

The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) reports today that insured tailgate thefts have stabilized since 2014. NICB analysis shows that in 2016, there were 1,877 claims for tailgate theft identified in ISO ClaimSearch®, an insurance industry claims database.

Carl Zaid wasn’t sure how to tell his wife their house had just burned to the ground, so he did it with the help of a flamingo.
Her name was Miss Pink, and she was perched in her usual spot in the front yard the night the family fled as flames approached from the canyon behind them.

Losing your home is one of the most traumatic experiences a person can go through. There are memories floating in every nook and cranny and sentiment attached to every photo or precious item.

A tweet by the local firefighter’s union Monday showed a photo of a Tesla Model S with its nose wedged under the back end of a fire truck and its hood badly wrinkled. The car had been traveling at 65 miles an hour, the tweet said.

A 7.9-magnitude earthquake struck the Gulf of Alaska early on Tuesday, prompting warnings of a possible tsunami down the West Coast of North America.

Under pressure from state Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones, many insurance companies have agreed to make additional payments for personal property lost in the North Bay fires without requiring policyholders to fill out a detailed inventory.

A group of Southern California homeowners charge that the rupture of a water main during last week’s mudslide released as much as 10 million gallons of water into the community of Montecito, overwhelming a flood control system already deluged with heavy rains.

Officials say seven people remain hospitalized a week after they were injured in mudslides that devastated the coastal California town of Montecito, killing 20. Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital says that as of Monday evening, two of the seven still undergoing treatment were in critical condition.

Aon Benfield’s Impact Forecasting unit released a report predicting that the California mudslide brought on by heavy rains following massive wildfires in the region will generate widespread losses. Overall, the report predicts an economic loss above $100 million. That said, the insured losses will be within the tens of millions.

Weeks after devastating fires tore through Southern California, heavy rains sent mudslides rolling down hillsides in Santa Barbara County on Tuesday, leaving 13 people dead. The storm uprooted trees and homes, and left mangled cars and abandoned surfboards on the streets.

Debra Salem-Drake was packing to evacuate as a wildfire moved within a half-mile of her Ventura home when she got a surprising call. Her insurance company was offering to come spray her home with fire-blocking gel...for free.

Thousands of Southern Californians fled their homes on Monday as a powerful rain storm that could cause flash floods and trigger mudslides soaked steep slopes where a series of intense wildfires burned off vegetation last month.

State Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones on Thursday called on the state Legislature to change California law to prevent more homeowners from losing their coverage because of wildfire risk, an issue that has been exacerbated by last year’s North Bay fires.

Insurers will have to pay claims of around $135 billion for 2017, the most ever, following a spate of hurricanes, earthquakes and fires in North America, according to a report published on Thursday.