Going to Florida

Autocharge said:

I just started rereading this post after I had abandoned it , while I had returned to work for a time. During this time I had written an " After action report" to shear with the local MVPA club. Now I thought I would shear it here. This report was written in Sep 2018.

“After action report”

Natural staging area The last big fuel station going into the disaster area. In this instance I-45 Buc-ee's Fueling station. This is where we ran into people coming out of and going into Houston people would transfer cases of water to my truck because I was going in and wish us luck . On my way out I transferred all the water I had to another group going in, cooperation at its best .

Stopping point I-45 was closed and I was forced to exit. Upon exiting I contacted a local officer on patrol and he gave me directions to the official staging area where I encountered engine 77 of the fire department.Engine 77 gave me my first assignment which was an address he showed me on his cell phone using Google Maps and he then sent me a text message with the link. I used Google Maps to get around. After my first drop off I picked up a local volunteer and used him as a navigator for the immediate neighborhood. We combed the residential neighborhood looking for people.

First night I slept in the back of my truck. The first night it was not good, the helicopter flew over once an hour picking people up, rain was continuous.

Second day I woke up early and had to leave the area to get supplies I felt I needed due to the circumstances, to be ready to help. I had to drive north of Houston about 30 minutes before I could find anything open. After getting supplies, I was contacted by a local Houston resident that wanted to go in and help. I used him as a navigator and together we managed to get back down into Houston. We had troubles because all of the roads and highways had flooded behind me on my way out. In Houston we started following the police Hummer all the way to the police station. There we signed up with North Houston police station and started taking orders.Midday Checked in with East Side Fire Marshal where we sat until we got assignments from them. We got an assignment about 7:30 p.m. to go to an apartment building and ask people if they wanted to evacuate. Water was almost chest-high at this point and no one wanted to evacuate so we secured for the night. We stayed in the conference room at the Sheraton it was set up for volunteers. They gave us a room to shower and clean up in.Third day Eastside staging area was our first assignments same apartment building that we had been in the night before. We were to make our way through it to the water, in the process of doing so we found our first dead body. Our following assignments were in residential areas with high water rescue necessary. The address turned out to be false, no such address. we got three more assignments. Three more addresses, high water rescue, turned out the roads were dry by now and no persons at the addresses. Locals said the people had been rescued 2 days ago.Noon Had lunch no further assignments on the east side Fire Chief requested that we be transferred to the West Side I agreed and got in contact with the West Side Fire Chief via texting, Then proceeded to the staging area.

Westside assignments We were to provide transport for police and fire personnel to a possible fire in an apartment building. In responding to this call we experienced high water of about four ½ feet. I drove in three quarters of a mile to get to the gates of the apartment. The water was too high to continue, so we unloaded personnel and backed out of the high water and waited for personnel to return. After waiting approximately 20-25 minutes the truck had taken on water in the snorkel and the engine had stopped. Now I needed to be rescued, for about 30 minutes until I figured out how to bypass the intake on the diesel motor. After removing the boot on the intake the engine started and I was able to self recover and was able to drive out to dry land . I waited there for and returned personnel to Westside staging area and checked out with Westside fire chief. Reason, truck not high water capable, therefore, not anymore ineffective.I returned home to repair the truck.

After I made the repairs , I started to return to Houston. During the drive down, the alternator broke. Truck is now broken again.Saturday morning unable to fix the truck, forced to return home.Started repairs again and prep for Florida.

Observations People frustrated with 911 use social media to call for help. Results double or triple tickets. People rescued and not reported waste of rescue resources, but safe.

Solo Solo volunteers are at risk of being victims themselves.

Groups of volunteers Groups of volunteers are eager and capable but with no direction or leader, they're are ineffective and time and money are wasted..I know just enough to check in with local authorities and protocols to be the point of contact for the groups of people that followed the “Big Green Truck”. They followed the truck not me I carried the officers in charge of the department on two separate occasions. I was involved in two groups Group 1, consisted of 10 watercrafts and Northside police.Group 2 day two.Day two the second group was 6 watercraft and five Laredo police officers armed. All volunteers, this group was ineffective prior to our first assignment. Parts of the group containing boats chose to go to Beaumont therefore left our group. Our first assignment was an apartment on dry land the boats did not want to follow and waste gas so the group was split again. second assignment was high water where the boats had responded to but two jet skis had deployed the pontoon boat did not deploy the jet skis were ineffective one sucked up trash and broke down the other one overheated. I ended up driving through high water to an address that did not exist the second group of volunteers at best was ineffective, quite possibly even needing rescue themselves. By lunch this group had completely broken down it was just me and my navigator and the truck now. We reported to Westside as requested by the Eastside Fire Marshal.on paper

Group 1
1 high water vehicle with transport ability and Recovery capability
10 watercraft
20 local police.

Group 21 high water vehicle with transport ability and Recovery capabilities
6 watercraft
5 armed security personnel

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