If Maria Response was like Hurricane Andrew Response

After Hurricane Andrew hit South Florida, FEMA "awaited requests from the State of Florida. Unfortunately, the damage was so tremendous that State officials were unable to comprehend the damage and the needs of people in the disaster area. They couldn't ask for what they didn't know they needed."

Puerto Rico was in much the same situation after Hurricane Maria. But instead of learning the lessons from Hurricane Andrew (something that might have happened had FEMA been led by a more senior person with some connection to this administration), Trump drove the country to distraction.

Almost three weeks after Maria struck Puerto Rico, just 15 percent of the island’s electricity customers have power, according to numbers posted on a website run by the government of Puerto Rico. Half the island lacks phone service, and about 40 percent of households lack access to potable water.

Hurricane Andrew destroyed 65,000 homes, knocked out water, electricity and phones, and filled roads with heavy debris.  The devastation caused by Andrew prompted a full federal response.  By contrast, Hurricane Maria -- coming on the heals of Hurricane Irma -- caused "total destruction."  Even Trump described Puerto Rico as “absolutely obliterated.”

What would be happening now if the Trump Administration responded with the same kind of effort that the first President Bush employed after Hurricane Andrew:

• If Andrew is used as a guide, more than 845,000 homes in Puerto Rico could be totally destroyed.  Of course, it could be more.
• The president would have had a Defense Coordinating Officer assigned before the storm hit landfall.  A Joint Task Force would have been created for interoperations between services.  A Presidential Task Force would have been appointed when the extent of the crisis in response became evident.
• Military Areas of Operations would be assigned, and local assistance requests would have been coordinated through those (instead of using twitter).
• Instead of the 3 medical units (44th Medical Brigade and the medical units assigned to the 82nd Airborne and 10th Mountain Division) mobilized for Andrew, Puerto Rico would be assigned 39 military medical units.

During Andrew recovery efforts, military engineers filled the gap until contractors, NGO relief organizations and local communities could mobilize to continue disaster recovery.  Instead of the 750 USACE personnel assigned to Puerto Rico, the US Army Corps of Engineers utilized 2,500 of USACE and 841st Engineering Battalion personnel, 600 Army employees and 4,000 contractor personnel to remove debris at the start of recovery efforts.  If Andrew is used as a guide, 32,500 USACE and Army Reserve engineers would be assigned to Puerto Rico by now.  Another 7,800 Army employees would be sent and 52,000 contractor employees would have arrived in Puerto Rico.  2860 dump trucks and 715 bucket loaders would be sent. 

Instead of the "six U.S. Navy helicopters and three U.S. Marine Corps V-22 Osprey aircraft launched from the USS Kearsarge Amphibious Readiness Group," Joint Task Force Andrew utilized 120 DoD helicopters.  Another 1,014 USAF sorties were flown during Andrew recovery efforts.

In Puerto Rico, with 3.4 MILLION people affected, FEMA sent more than 1.3 million meals, whereas 1 million MREs were delivered for the 250,000 people left without homes after Hurricane Andrew.

No one should be bragging about disaster recovery efforts in Puerto Rico.  A competent administration would be trying to figure out how to respond adequately to the mess left in the wake of Hurricane Maria...