Insurer: One Hail Of A Storm
By Karen Blackledge, The Daily Item, Sunbury, Pa. | |
McClatchy-Tribune Information Services |
The Valley demand for rental cars has been so heavy that one company was summoning up to 1,000 vehicles from
The number of claims he has seen rivals anything in nearly three decades he has been in the insurance business, Groninger said. His office had already had 160 claims as of midafternoon Friday.
"This wasn't anything small," Groninger said. "I've been doing this for 27 years and this is the worst claim (event) I've seen. It happened so fast and so was quick and in such a condensed area. We had no claims from
Some of the vehicles may take up to two months to repair, Groninger said.
The ice balls also caused extensive damage to homes in
A crew from
Hail remained at the front entrance to the Wagner home late Friday morning. Two windows in their home were broken by the pounding of hail.
Blue said the crew had several yards to clean and expected to be putting in a long day.
On
Meanwhile, Hawkins Collision Center, near
"I watched my own vehicle get hit," center office manager
Geisinger lot takes hit
Many damaged vehicles parked at
Hawkins Collision Center will be hiring "hail people" to repair vehicle bodies and glass company workers to replace windshields, Hendrickson said. The major insurance companies with which the center works with will set up a tent at Hawkins to provide estimates.
Hendrickson said it was too soon to tell when vehicles could be repaired.
"The number 1 concern is glass breakage so they can be fixed up so they can be driven," she said.
Hawkins body shop manager
At Swartz Ultimate Collision Repair, along
"Immediately after the storm, we started to get calls," Smith said. "We worked late (Thursday) night to cover up where glass was smashed out."
Outside companies, from as far as
"Paint work and parts replacement we will do here," Smith said. "This is a collaboration to get the vehicles back to the people as soon as we can."
As of Friday, he didn't have a time line until catastrophic loss teams assess the damage.
"I heard customers were looking at two months," he said.
The damage is still being assessed to nearly 300 vehicles on the lot of
More than 200 vehicles, on the
An insurance agent wasn't spared from the storm.
By the end of Thursday,
A Danville Nationwide office was busy Friday with dozens of calls coming in, customer service representative
According to
Hailstorms don't usually cause fatalities but about 24 people are injured each year by hail in
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