Friday, February 15, 2013

The good news: your insurance likely covers meteorites & space junk

In light of the passing asteroid and the (unrelated, apparently) meteorite that hit Russia last night, we'd point out that in the extremely unlikely event of a meteorite or old satellite crashing into your home, your insurance would likely cover the damage to you, your car, business or -- hopefully not -- yourself.

The Insurance Information Institute took a look at this issue a couple of years ago, concluding that:

"Damages caused by falling objects are generally covered under standard auto, business, homeowners and life insurance policies."

Our in-house consumer hotline folks add that if a meteor struck near a home, with no direct hit, but that the impact and shock wave caused damage, that damage too would likely be covered in a standard policy.

Again, the odds of getting hit by something like this are very, very low, although not zero. An Alabama woman was struck by a meteorite in 1954, and in 1992, a car in New York state was hit.

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