[palmer]

This could have been every bit as bad as forecast.

Absolutely. It had a chance of beating Miami 1926, the most expensive hurricane on record. It could have wiped out a couple keys like 1935. But instead it took the Donna track and had even more Cuba interaction than Donna. Donna was a top 10 most expensive hurricane and Irma will be also, but much less expensive than it could have been.

[palmer]

Here's the list of most expensive hurricanes: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/NormalizedHurricane2008.pdf (see table 2)

List is old (2008 I think) so doesn't include Sandy. I don't think Sandy surpassed the cost of Miami 1926. Or maybe it did, Pielke Jr would know.