t is, of course, most important to recognize the people who lost their lives that day, but there were other effects as well.
For one, what happens with the people who owned the buildings? The Port Authority owned the World Trade Center buildings but were in the process of selling them at the time of the attacks.
The new owners were actually supposed to meet in one of the buildings on September 11th to discuss what would happen in the event of a terrorist attack.
The meeting was cancelled the day before because one of the participants couldn’t make it.
Luckily, the site was insured, as overall damages were in the trillions. The attacks cost insurance companies $39.5 billion, including property, business interruption, aviation, workers’ compensation, life and liability insurance claim costs.
About two thirds of these losses were paid for by reinsurers, companies that provide insurance for insurers.
For some perspective, the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing resulted in insured losses of $125 million and the Los Angeles riots of 1992 resulted in insured losses of $775 million.
At the time, September 11th was the costliest disaster in American history. It was surpassed a few years later by Hurricane Katrina.
