Providing shelter to those displaced top priority for deployed relief teams
Robert Picard is among the American Red Cross of Massachusetts officials who have deployed to Houston to assist the thousands of residents who have been displaced by historic flooding caused by Tropical Storm Harvey, which experts say could dump as much as 50 inches of rain on the city. Picard of Brookline told the Herald’s Owen Boss about the rapidly deteriorating situation.
“We’re doing everything we can. The most important thing we’re doing right now is providing shelters, opening shelters so that people can get in some place safe and dry where we can make sure they’re fed, they’re getting stuff for their kids and all the things that they’ll need to survive during this period . ... It has been very difficult. The hurricane came in and it’s dropped up to 25 inches of rain and it’s continuing to come down and it’s spawned tornadoes ...
The volunteers are basically trying to take care of the needs of everybody that’s still here in the shelters; feeding them, providing medical care and whatever else they may need ... We have thousands of deployed up and down the entire coast who are doing the same thing . ...
At the moment it appears to be getting worse. The real problem is that the storm keeps going back out to sea, turning into a tropical storm and then coming back in again so the water is rising everywhere. We expect another 2 feet of water in the next two days and most of the roadways are already closed, meaning people cannot move. Around many communities now there are 2 to 3 feet of water into people’s homes — it’s a really difficult situation for everyone . ...
The National Weather Service is saying they have nothing on record compared to what’s happening here . ... The hurricane itself wasn’t all that bad. It was powerful and it was a hurricane but it didn’t do that much damage. But now that it’s just the sitting here, just continuing to dump all of this water — that’s doing a huge amount of damage.”