WALLA WALLA, Wash. – An U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Walla Walla District, employee deployed during the past weekend to support the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) hurricane response and recovery efforts, according to District emergency management officials.
The supply specialist from the Logistics Management Office at the District Headquarters in Walla Walla, Washington, will augment transportation operations for the Corps’ South Atlantic Division emergency operations center in Atlanta, Georgia. The Corp’s Logistics Planning and Response Team there has been coordinating movement of tractor-trailer rigs headed to support hurricane-recovery operations
FEMA coordinates the federal government's role in preparing for, preventing, mitigating the effects of, responding to, and recovering from all domestic disasters, whether natural or man-made, including acts of terror. For information about FEMA’s response to recent hurricane activity, visit their website www.fema.gov.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is prepared and ready to respond to natural and human-made disasters. The Corps has more than 50 specially-trained response teams supported by emergency contracts to perform a wide range of public works and engineering-related support missions. When disasters occur, Corps teams and other resources are mobilized from across the country to assist our local districts and offices to deliver our response missions. The Corps is part of the federal government’s unified national response to disasters and emergencies, and serves as the lead agency to respond with public works and engineering support, and to coordinate long-term infrastructure recovery. The Corps conducts its emergency response activities under two basic authorities – the Flood Control and Coastal Emergency Act, and mission-assigned by FEMA, under the Stafford Disaster and Emergency Assistance Act.
In any disaster, the Corps’ top priorities are 1) support immediate life-saving and life-safety response priorities; 2) sustain lives with critical commodities, temporary emergency power and other needs; and 3) initiate recovery efforts by assessing and restoring critical infrastructure.
Currently, the Corps has received about 100 FEMA mission assignments to support disaster-response needs resulting from hurricanes, Maria, Irma and Harvey. Twenty-nine of those missions are for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. About 950 Corps personnel are engaged and operating in coordination with county, state and FEMA partners to help provide temporary emergency power, debris technical assistance, navigation restoration, temporary housing, infrastructure assessments, and environmental restoration and preservation. Check out www.usace.army.mil/Missions/EmergencyOperations.aspx for more information about the Corps of Engineers’ emergency management mission and roles in supporting national disasters.
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NOTE TO EDITORS/NEWS DIRECTORS: At the request of deployees, the names of those supporting disaster-response operations will not be released until they return from deployment. Please, contact the Public Affairs Office with any questions.