At a time when the last thing we need is more bad news, the weather has offered no help at all, as lines of severe weather have thundered through large swaths of the southern United States, the last one just this past weekend. Eighteen people were killed by the storms in Louisiana alone, and more than 300 homes were heavily damaged or destroyed there, while in South Carolina this morning, tornadoes slammed the airport in Walterboro, destroying a number of planes and buildings, as well, including a vintage Douglas C-54 Skymaster.
On Sunday morning, a powerful twister destroyed a number of hangars and planes, including at least a few high-dollar bizjets, at Monroe Regional Airport in Louisiana. It was the third important GA reliever airport to get hit in recent weeks, after Nashville, Tennessee’s John C. Tune got hammered in early March and Arkansas’ Jonesboro got slammed two weeks ago.
Then this morning the Lowcountry Airport at Walterboro, South Carolina, got hammered. Photos of the damage show many aircraft heavily damaged or destroyed, including the C-54, which sustained major damage but which remained on its gear. The same was not true for some other panes, one of which, apparently a Beechcraft Bonanza, wound up across the street from the airport ramp upside down in a shallow pool of water.
There’s been no word on the number of airplanes destroyed in the tornados, but based on our analysis of photographs of the devastation, we’d estimate the number to be anywhere from 50 to 125, with many of those planes turned into scrap metal being business jets with a likely average value of at least $10 million.
The bad news has sparked concerns among pilots that the losses, which are surely north of $100 million to the aircraft themselves, never mind the hangars or other facilities, will mean increases in insurance premiums in a market already suffering from steeply rising insurance costs and limited competition.
