Local insurers yesterday said they had received claims for damage from Hurricane Fabian of between $70 million and $75 million.

BF&M president and chief executive officer Glenn Titterton said it was difficult to make accurate estimates at this early stage and the figure would probably have to be revised upward as time went on, but 2,600 claims had been logged with all of the Island's insurance companies.

“This is a very early and sketchy estimate,” he said. “We are in the midst of so much, you cannot get an accurate figure yet as there are so many claims.”

But he said a preliminary study by AIR Worldwide Corp of $350 million and published on Monday was “grossly exaggerated”.

Mr. Titterton said he was familiar with the model used to get the figure, and it constantly threw up high figures for catastrophes. He said it used only Caribbean data where houses are built to lower specifications than in Bermuda.