Cat 48

The two digit catastrophe serial numbers are assigned by the Catastrophe Service Division of Property Claims Services (PCS) which is a dvision of ISO (Insurance Service Office) which serves the insurance industry and carriers.

PCS assigns to each catastrophe a serial number recognized throughout the industry. Use of this number permits insurers and reinsurers to track reserves and losses to a single discrete event. It is also important for triggering reinsurance coverages under many contracts. Before assigning a serial number, PCS investigates each disaster and determines whether the insurable damage will meet the catastrophe definition. That definition is $25 million in insured damage involving a large number of policyholders and insurers.
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The only national cat codes assigned are from the PCS Division of ISO in New Jersey. They assign cat codes when an "incident" is of the magnitude that they consider to be a significant event.

The most recent were NYC, Cat 48, and TS "Gabrielle" Cat 49.

Many companies will assign a cat code to an event that occurs in an area, or even a sequence of events closely related. It is not uncommon for there to be cat codes for the same event, in the same state, to be of different numbers, letters or designations. All that is up to the respective companies."

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