Guardian: October was a month that creaked and cracked. The insurance industry, already deeply implicated in the international financial crash, was battered by the fall-out from hurricanes Ike and Gustav. Their bill is estimated to be around $30bn (£18.2bn), far higher than predicted, according to Lloyd’s of London. To show that God has a dark – you could call it “carbon black” – sense of humour, in the same month the oil giant BP’s quarterly profits of £6.4bn cracked another record high, while …