Press

Catherine Hooper is one of the more intriguing entrepreneurs I’ve met recently. Her startup, Black Umbrella, provides services to help people prepare for floods, hurricanes, nuclear war and pretty much any other disaster we might fear. Hooper knows disasters: She is the fiance of Andrew Madoff, Bernie Madoff’s son whose career collapsed when his dad (who was his employer) was discovered to be the world’s greatest Ponzi schemer. I profiled Hooper in Fortune last March. Last week, when Sandy blew up the East Coast, I emailed her and asked if she learned anything from the storm. She did. Sandy convinced Hooper that we’re confronting a new normal and we had better be prepare for it.