Australia’s insurers are increasingly introducing satellite technology into their flood response capabilities to reengineer traditional processes and ensure faster, better outcomes for those impacted, as Paul Sowden of satellite systems provider ICEYE told Insurance News.

The first five months of 2025 brought a series of climate disasters in Australia, including drought, cyclone, and the devastating West Queensland Floods. Further south, the mid-north coast of New South Wales has experienced record-breaking flooding, which, according to Australia’s Climate Council, is the result of more water in the atmosphere, a hotter climate, and changing atmospheric rivers (‘rivers’ of water vapour in the sky).

Australia’s sheer size exacerbates this challenge for insurers. Even with teams spread over the whole country, they can still be several hundred kilometres away from the impacted communities, which significantly slows response times and makes critical decision-making extremely challenging.

The resulting customer dissatisfaction was highlighted in the 2024 report from the Parliament of Australia’s House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics’ following its inquiry into insurers’ response to 2022 major flood claims. The findings included the fact that some customers were so badly let down, they were traumatised.

Insurers are, however, responding proactively and innovatively - and the industry now has a clear focus on the differentiating factors that drive better responses for policyholders impacted by floods. Paul Sowden, strategic account manager for SAR satellite systems provider ICEYE, says customer service is one of the main competition grounds.

“It's very interesting to see how the insurance industry as a whole is talking in the same language about getting ahead of flood events and ensuring they are first to respond for their customers,” he says.

This is a key reason why, as the severity of events increases, more insurers are turning to ICEYE to help them deliver effective, data-driven responses. ICEYE’s satellite technology enables them to monitor flood extent and depth in near real-time. Five of the top six insurers in Australia are now ICEYE clients.

ICEYE’s synthetic aperture radar (SAR) technology can see through darkness and clouds, making it a reliable and consistent method of measuring and reporting flood hazard data before, during, and after a flood event.

It provides data for flood depth, extent, and duration within hours of a given flood peak, enabling its clients to calculate losses, manage their risks, and carry out disaster response efforts more effectively, even going so far as to re-engineer traditional processes.

Examples include using ICEYE data to more effectively manage the use of loss adjusters and contractors by allocating them certain postcodes to cover, thus avoiding a mosaic effect in which multiple adjusters visit the same area.  

“Some of the companies have their own loss adjusting resource, in which case they may not automatically appoint a loss adjuster, but review cases as they come in based on information from ICEYE to ascertain the best possible allocation of resources for their policyholders,” adds Sowden. 

The data may, for example, enable an insurer to decide to appoint a loss adjuster only where the flood water exceeds a certain depth.

In cases where that depth is not exceeded, they may use their own internal loss-adjusting resource. While in severe cases, they may appoint a contractor first, if stripping and drying out the property are the priority. Such rapid actions can reduce loss costs, limit the need for lengthy stays in temporary accommodation, and get the insured back into their property much faster.

“Insurers are using ICEYE’s data to rethink their existing processes to deliver a much faster and more effective response during these devastating events. Just because they have done it a certain way for 20 years doesn't mean they have to continue to do it that way – certainly not with the data they now have available to them,” says Sowden.

Other inefficiencies addressed using ICEYE data include accommodation provisions. Insurers can make data-driven decisions to block-book medium-term accommodation near areas that have been badly impacted to ensure a better experience for the insureds and to avoid burning through their policy limits by keeping them in hotel accommodation for too long. 

Insurers are also exploring ways to stimulate further differentiation by working with ICEYE to find new ways to utilise the satellite company’s flood data.

“Insurers are not just investing in the latest technology,” he explains, “but are working with us to innovate through the integration of ICEYE data into Agentic AI platforms and asking us to create simulated events to explore new applications, run different scenarios for potential events and ensure that their teams are fully prepared to better support their customers.”

He also sees a clear and strong focus by insurers on helping to manage the wider community impact of flood.

“For the insurers we work with it’s not just about the individual property owners that have been affected by the flood, but also about supporting the wider communities to recover from the devastating impact of a major flood event,” he says. 

“They want to help individual policyholders get back on their feet, but they also want to help the communities. Because we're providing data on the whole event, they can understand not just which communities to prioritise but also assess their potential impact upon the community. For instance, do they take their own accommodation so that hotel rooms can be prioritised for impacted families rather than insurance teams?”

He is also seeing a focus on using ICEYE data to inform communications with customers ahead of and during flood events. 

“It's about communicating the things they can do to mitigate the potential effect of a flood and minimise the loss,” he says. 

The aim is to make sure insureds act wisely, rather than rashly. “Flood is a traumatic event,’ says Sowden. “If you haven't lost your home in a flood, it's hard to understand just how traumatic it is, and how challenging it can be for those affected to make the right decisions when they’ve just lost some of their most treasured possessions.”

ICEYE’s data is helping insurers respond to floods more effectively and empathetically. By enabling smarter decisions across all aspects of flood response, insurers can prioritise recovery efforts where they’re needed most. The result is faster recovery, reduced costs, and better outcomes for both individuals and communities.