Climate Change: 55 Weather Disasters costing a Billion Dollars Each hit our Earth the Past Year

The planet was besieged by 55 billion-dollar weather disasters in 2025, insurance broker Gallagher Re said in its annual report issued Jan. 21. The total damage wrought by weather disasters in 2024 was $277 billion; 45% of those costs were covered by insurance. The 2025 damages were 25% lower than the 10-year inflation-adjusted average of $367 billion.

A separate report issued Jan. 20 by insurance broker Aon put the total damage wrought by weather disasters in 2024 at $242 billion, with 47 billion-dollar weather disasters. Billion-dollar weather disasters cause about 76% of the total damages wrought by weather disasters, according to Steve Bowen of Gallagher Re.

The primary reason for the below-average total cost in 2025 was the absence of a landfalling U.S. hurricane for the first time since 2015. Gallagher Re’s report emphasized that nevertheless, “The persistent trend of a high volume of billion-dollar-plus global events highlights the urgent need for greater climate financing to mitigate, adapt and prepare against more expensive disasters.”

The report’s authors also called for stronger building codes, noting that “A 2019 study by the US National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) found that adopting building codes can translate to $11 saved for every $1 invested. Building to a modern code (either through new construction or retrofitting) was found to only add 1% to construction costs, relative to 1990 values.”

Severe convective storm events (including wind, flood, hail, and tornado damage from thunderstorms) in 2023, 2024, and 2025 cost global insurers a combined $208 billion in today’s dollars, of which $176 billion (85%) has occurred in the U.S. This peril is now a dominant annual loss driver for the industry.

U.S. sees its third-highest number of billion-dollar weather disasters: 23

As discussed in our Jan. 13 post, 2025 brought 23 weather-related U.S. disasters that each topped at least $1 billion in damage, according to the U.S. Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters website. The site was adopted by Climate Central last October after NOAA, its original creator, discontinued it in May 2025. Adam Smith, who had served as lead NOAA scientist on the project over the last 15 years, continues to lead the project at its new home at Climate Central, where he is now senior climate impacts scientist.

The U.S. billion-dollar disasters of 2025 caused a total of 276 direct fatalities. Their estimated cost, according to Climate Central, was $311 billion (USD 2026). This puts the year in eighth place among the 46 years of data after adjusting for inflation. The year’s tally of 23 billion-dollar events was the third-highest in the 46-year database.

Using different accounting methods, Gallagher Re and Aon tallied 28 and 27 U.S.-billion-dollar weather disasters for 2025, respectively.

Costliest weather event of 2025: the Los Angeles fires

The costliest event of the year by far was a series of cataclysmic wildfires that ravaged more than 57,000 acres (89 square miles) across the Los Angeles area in early January. As reported by Climate Central, the total direct losses were estimated at $61 billion, making it the 10th-costliest weather disaster in world history. Most of the damage was caused by the massive Palisades and Eaton fires, which were the two most expensive wildfires in world history, with $37 billion and $28 billion in losses, respectively, according to Gallagher Re. That $65 billion combined damage total was modestly higher than Climate Central’s $61 billion estimate.

The second-costliest weather disaster of 2025 was seasonal flooding in China that did $23 billion in damage and killed 362 people. This was China’s 10th-costliest weather disaster on record, and Asia’s 12th-costliest.

Deadliest weather disaster of 2025: European heat wave kills more than 24,000

Earth’s third-hottest year on record caused more than 24,000 deaths during a summer heat wave in Europe. This ranks as the sixth-deadliest heat wave in world history.

The deadliest storm of 2025 was Tropical Cyclone Senyar, which killed 1,482 people in Indonesia, Thailand, and Myanmar. In addition, seasonal monsoon floods in India and Pakistan killed 1,200 and 1,077 people, respectively, and a landslide in Sudan killed 1,000 people.

Drought losses well below average in 2025

According to Aon, drought caused approximately $13 billion in losses globally in 2025, well below the 2000-2024 average of $40 billion per year. The most expensive drought occurred in Brazil, with about $5 billion in losses. Brazil has suffered $139 billion in drought-related losses over the past 30 years, and Aon said “high drought conditions could endanger roughly 54% of global coffee crops by 2050.”

In the U.S., drought caused $2.4 billion in economic losses and $1.2 billion in crop insured losses in 2025. Both figures are well below their long-term averages and among the lowest annual totals recorded in the 21st century.

Photo of Coastal street flooding on Carolina Beach, NC during king tide by Richard R on Unsplash

Two nations suffered their costliest weather disasters on record in 2025

Using statistics from Gallagher Re for 2025 and EM-DAT for years before 2025, two nations or territories suffered their most expensive weather disasters on record in 2025: Jamaica and Sri Lanka. For comparison, four nations or territories had their most expensive weather-related natural disaster in history (relative to GDP) in 2024, and seven did so in 2023. Note that these tallies will be considerably different using Aon or Gallagher Re disaster figures, which can differ from EM-DAT’s by a factor of two. Gallagher Re’s database is generally superior to EM-DAT’s but is not publicly available.

Jamaica: Mighty Category 5 Hurricane Melissa made landfall in October in southwestern Jamaica with 185 mph (300 kph) winds, tying for first place as the strongest landfalling hurricane on record anywhere in the Atlantic. Melissa killed 54 people in Jamaica, and a rapid damage assessment from the World Bank indicated an economic loss in Jamaica of $8.8 billion, 41% of the country’s 2024 gross domestic product. Jamaica’s previous costliest weather disaster was Category 4 Hurricane Gilbert of 1988, which inflicted damages of $1 billion ($2.7 billion 2025 USD), 26% of its GDP at the time.

Sri Lanka: Slow-moving Cyclone Ditwah dumped prodigious amounts of rain over Sri Lanka in late November and early December, causing catastrophic flooding that killed 643 people and caused $4.1 billion in damage. This was equivalent to 4% of the nation’s GDP. Sri Lanka’s previous most expensive weather disaster (adjusted for inflation) was flooding in 2016 that cost $1.6 billion and killed 203 people. Only two previous tropical cyclones have been deadlier in Sri Lanka: Cyclone 04B in 1978 (1,500 killed) and the Rameswaram Cyclone of December 1964 (1,000 killed).

Bob Henson contributed to this post.