FLORIDA — With Hurricane Helene set to make landfall Thursday evening, Texas companies and volunteer groups have already deployed personnel and resources to northwest Florida and Georgia to help in the storm's aftermath.
Helene is expected to be a major hurricane. Thursday morning forecasts are predicting it could be a high-end Category 3 storm, with wind speeds exceeding 120 mph at landfall in the Florida Panhandle.
Because of those predictions, state officials and other groups across Texas have deployed resources to Florida with even more resources on standby should they be requested.
Gov. Greg Abbott announced Tuesday that he had directed the Texas Division of Emergency Management to deploy the Texas A&M Task Force 1 after receiving a request from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The deployment includes an 80-person urban search-and-rescue team, 15 vehicles, six boats and six dogs.
“Texas will always stand with our fellow Americans and lend a helping hand during times of crisis,” said Abbott in a news release. “Texans understand firsthand the importance of hurricane preparedness and the ability to deploy resources for a swift response effort to protect those impacted by a storm.”
The American Red Cross, with chapters across Texas and the nation, has mobilized to send volunteers and resources to the areas expected to be most affected by Helene.
“We’ve been making decisions since Sunday based on weather information that is still developing,” said Brad Kieserman, the Red Cross’ vice president of disaster operations and logistics, in a news release. “That’s how we create planning assumptions and mobilize in time to make a difference. We look at the risks, we look at the timeline and we recognized that if we didn’t start moving resources starting Monday morning, we wouldn’t have the resources in place by Wednesday to support our partners and the community.”
About 360 Red Cross disaster workers have been sent to the Florida Panhandle, hauling with them trailers of resources. The Red Cross in the Central and South Texas Region has sent nine volunteers to Florida and dozens more are on standby, according to reporting from News 4 San Antonio.
North Texas utility company Oncor told Spectrum News 1 that about 200 contract resources were heading to Florida and Georgia to support the restoration efforts.
CenterPoint Energy, an electric and natural gas company based in Houston, began sending crews out to Florida Wednesday morning ahead of the storm making landfall.
“Safety is our top priority – teams inspected their equipment, prepped their vehicles and held safety briefings to help ensure a safe arrival and safe return home,” CenterPoint Energy said in a Facebook post.
The company said they are sending approximately 90 internal and contract lineworkers and support personnel from Houston to the northwest coast of Florida.
In another social media post, CenterPoint said it received help in its “time of need and we’re now answering the call.”
On July 8, Hurricane Beryl hit southeast Texas as a Category 1 storm and knocked out power to nearly 3 million people in Texas—mostly in the Houston area.
CenterPoint’s power restoration response has been called into question after some people were without power for a week during the heat of the Texas summer. At least 36 people were confirmed to have died because of heat complications after losing power.
CenterPoint officials testified before the Texas Senate in late July about the events that led up to the prolonged power outages, and the CEO Jason Wells apologized to customers and said the company will “do better.”