Pakistan arrive in Bengaluru; team celebrates Babar Azam's birthday
Bengaluru (PTI): Pakistan players chose to confine themselves to their hotel rooms upon their arrival here from Ahmedabad on Sunday, but the relatively low-key touchdown did not prevent them from celebrating the birthday of captain Babar Azam.
The players cut a cake at the team hotel as Babar turned 29 on Sunday.
"It was a small function attended by the players and support staff. There were not many activities today as it was a travel day, and the team will soon start preparations for the upcoming matches," said an official travelling with the team.
Pakistan will face Australia on October 20 at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, and they will be eager to give a better account of themselves after the seven-wicket mauling at the hands of India on Saturday.
This is also Pakistan's first visit to Bengaluru since 2012. They had then beaten India by five wickets in the first T20I match of the two-match series.
Pakistan have also played just two ODIs in the Garden City in the quarterfinals of the 1996 World Cup and in the final of the Pepsi Cup in 1999.
While the Green Brigade had lost the World Cup match, they had beaten India by 123 runs in the Pepsi Cup.
"Bengaluru is a welcoming city and we are happy to be here. The climate too seems a lot cooler here. Hopefully, there will not be rain as we have seen some reports of heavy rains in some parts of South India," the official said.
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Los Angeles county wildfires could be costliest in US history, early estimates say
Los Angeles, Jan 11: The wildfires that erupted this week across Los Angeles County are still raging, but already are projected to be among the costliest natural disasters in US history.
The devastating blazes have killed at least 11 people and incinerated more than 12,000 structures since Tuesday, laying waste to entire neighbourhoods once home to multimillion-dollar properties.
While it's still too early for an accurate tally of the financial toll, the losses so far likely make the wildfires the costliest ever in the US, according to various estimates.
A preliminary estimate by AccuWeather put the damage and economic losses so far between USD 135 billion and USD 150 billion. By comparison, AccuWeather estimated the damage and economic losses caused by Hurricane Helene, which tore across six southeastern states last fall, at USD 225 billion to USD 250 billion.
“This will be the costliest wildfire in California modern history and also very likely the costliest wildfire in US modern history, because of the fires occurring in the densely populated areas around Los Angeles with some of the highest-valued real estate in the country,” said Jonathan Porter, the private firm's chief meteorologist.
AccuWeather factors in a multitude of variables in its estimates, including damage to homes, businesses, infrastructure and vehicles, as well as immediate and long-term health care costs, lost wages and supply chain interruptions.
The insurance broker Aon PLC also said Friday that the LA County wildfires will likely end up being the costliest in US history, although it did not issue an estimate. Aon ranks a wildfire known as the Camp Fire in Paradise, California, in 2018 as the costliest in US history up to now at USD 12.5 billion, adjusted for inflation. The Camp Fire killed 85 people and destroyed about 11,000 homes.
The LA County wildfires, which were fuelled by hurricane-force Santa Ana winds and an extreme drought, remained largely uncontained Saturday. That means the final tally of losses from the blazes is likely to increase, perhaps substantially.
“To put this into perspective, the total damage and economic loss from this wildfire disaster could reach nearly 4 per cent of the annual GDP of the state of California,” AccuWeather's Porter said.
In a report Friday, Moody's also concluded that the wildfires would prove to be the costliest in US history, specifically because they have ripped through densely populated areas with higher-end properties.
While the state is no stranger to major wildfires, they have generally been concentrated in inland areas that are not densely populated. That's led to less destruction per acre, and in damage to less expensive homes, Moody's noted.
That's far from the case this time, with one of the largest conflagrations destroying thousands of properties across the Pacific Palisades and Malibu, home to many Hollywood stars and executives with multimillion-dollar properties. Already, numerous celebrities have lost homes to the fires.
“The scale and intensity of the blazes, combined with their geographic footprint, suggest a staggering price tag, both in terms of the human cost and the economic toll,” Moody's analysts wrote. The report did not include a preliminary cost estimate of the wildfire damage.
It could be several months before a concrete tally of the financial losses from the wildfires will be possible.
“We're in the very early stages of this disaster,” Porter said.
