Make Sure Your Policy Covers Freak Disasters

Floridians know how to prepare for hurricanes. San Franciscans are versed in how to act in an earthquake.

But New Yorkers have little experience with cyclones -- unless you're talking about the famed roller-coaster at Coney Island.

So when a twister touched down in Brooklyn, N.Y, earlier this month, many residents --including me -- were left wondering whether they are covered for disasters that rarely happen in their region.

The tornado was the borough's first in 118 years, and it came complete with 135 mph winds that uprooted trees and damaged homes in some areas. As a native Kansan, I know too well the destruction a twister can spawn -- my junior year of college, a funnel ripped through my apartment complex claiming random second floors, roofs and garage doors for souvenirs.

My fellow Kansans and other Midwesterners are experts at finding the best doorway or bathroom -- absent a basement -- to wait out a feisty funnel cloud. They can also tell you how important renters insurance is. Inevitably we all know someone (95% of the city of Greensburg, Kan. on May 4, for instance) who lost it all in one of Mother Nature's temper tantrums, and we're marginally prepared as a region.

But what about weather that's unnatural for your region? The good news is that the risk of weather that graces a region less than once a century is as tiny as it sounds and doesn't merit added concern, according to insurance representatives and brokers.

"There are different classes of carriers: Some are like Hondas, some are like BMWs and some are like Ferraris, with regard to the level of coverage they'll provide," said Harry Rubenstein, an account executive at Harold L. Lee and Sons, an insurance broker based in New York.