The presentation placed the recent events in a wider sequence: the 2017 Knysna fires, floods and storm surge in 2022–23, the July 2024 cut-off low, and the May 2026 extreme rainfall event. The presentation cited a Garden Route District Municipality assessment of more than R500 million in municipal infrastructure and facility damage from the May event alone, excluding the wider losses borne by households, businesses and farms.
The key concern is recurrence. Fire, flood and storm-surge losses are no longer treated as once-in-a-generation shocks. When damaging events arrive repeatedly, insurers do not assess each one in isolation. They reassess the expected cost of future claims across the whole area.
That can mean higher premiums, higher excesses, narrower terms, stricter underwriting and, in the most exposed locations, reduced willingness to offer cover at all.