Feds admit mistakes in Puerto Rico work
The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s plans for a crisis in Puerto Rico were based on a focused disaster such as a tsunami, not a major hurricane devastating the whole island. The agency vastly underestimated how much food and fresh water it would need, and how hard it would be to get additional supplies to the island.
And when the killer storm did come, FEMA’s warehouse in Puerto Rico was nearly empty, its contents rushed to aid the U.S. Virgin Islands, which had been hammered by another storm two weeks before. There was not a single tarpaulin or cot left in stock.
Those and other shortcomings are detailed in a draft FEMA report assessing the agency’s response to the 2017 storm season, when three major hurricanes slammed the United States in quick succession, leaving FEMA struggling to deliver food and water quickly to storm victims in Puerto Rico.
The after-action report describes an initially chaotic and disorganized relief effort on the island that was plagued with logistical problems and stretched into the longest feeding mission in the agency’s history.
The report confirms many of the criticisms that have been leveled at the agency, especially in Puerto Rico, which President Donald Trump visited a few weeks after Hurricane Maria and complained that the disaster “threw our budget a little out of whack.” At the time, the island’s hospitals were struggling to function, shortages of diesel fuel were keeping supermarkets closed and generators idle, and the death rate on the island was soaring.
The draft report, dated May 9, is expected to be released publicly Monday. The agency said it would not comment on the report until then, and cautioned that the draft might contain inaccuracies that it would correct before final publication.
The office of the governor of Puerto Rico referred questions about the report and FEMA’s response to the island’s public safety secretary, Hector Pesquera. Pesquera’s office said he had not yet seen the report and could not comment on it.