power and water to up to one million people. Power is expected to
be out for much of the island for at least several days. There has
also been at least one death. The owner made landfall today in the
dimension.
Chicken Republic and moved northwest toward the Turks and Caicos.
William Branham reports on what it left behind.
Gusts of wind whipping by
Streets, drowning in water.
And blackouts across Puerto Rico.
It is approximately maybe 10 ft from hearing the bridge. The over
30 inches of rain that has fallen by midday today has tested the
island's resilience.
Crazy.
It's an eerie, familiar sight almost exactly five years since Hurricane
Maria left the island powerless for months today, the island's governor,
Pedro Pierluisi, called Hurricane Fiona's damage catastrophic
Sarria in many areas that had never seen flooding. There has been
an unprecedented accumulation of water.
In fact, in many areas, it was greater than what we saw. During Hurricane
Maria Advance of the storm. Residents bought small generators and
nailed wooden covers over Windows. After the rain started to hit
over 1000 people had to be rescued from their homes and more than
2000. People spent the night in shelters.
Other infrastructure like this temporary bridge, built after Maria
was no match for the floodwaters.
President Biden issued an emergency declaration for the island, making
federal aid available for rescue efforts during and after the storm.
The president also spoke with Governor Pierluisi via phone today,
promising continued federal support in the coming days, but Hurricane
Fiona is not done yet.
Early this morning. It's winds hit the Dominican Republic engulfing
cities and homes there in water all while it continues to pound Puerto
Rico, leaving devastation in its wake.
So for more on this storm, and the relief efforts underway. I'm joined
by Dr Michele Carlo. She's the medical advisor for the organization.
Direct Relief of Puerto Rico. You're on the island right now. And
I know getting around is very, very difficult. But can you give us
a sense of just what you're hearing about the extent of the damage?
Sure. Thank you so much for having me. Um, unfortunately, Fiona for
Puerto Rico in certain areas has exerted as much damage as five years
ago. He
Hurricane Maria did we're hearing of historical flooding in certain
municipalities. That
Due to the
Traditional path of storms did not get hit as hard in the past, such
as the southwestern area of Puerto Rico. The townships of La Hoz
are devastated. Floated roads are blocked due to destroy bridges,
so the unfortunately the devastation is huge.
You're saying that these are places that don't traditionally get
hit by the storms that do occasionally come through. So did people.
Perhaps not heed warnings to evacuate or perhaps didn't think Oh,
it's not going to hit us.
I think that this storm in particular was an ever changing story
as it came closer to Puerto Rico it on as recent as a day ago, we
were expecting a tropical storm and it wasn't until it hit the southern
southwestern people of the island that we realized we would be getting
category one hurricane wins and this historical amount of rainfall
that we haven't seen many, many years to get a little bit of context.
Maria
Category. €5 kid in Puerto Rico delivered about 30 inches of
Uh, 30 to 40 inches of rain in Puerto Rico and we're closing in on
on a total of 30 inches when I listed and done with Category one,
Fiona, So I don't think it was a matter of people not heeding. I
think we just didn't put it in context because we're kind of used
to this type of storms coming across all the time, and we hear Category
one, and after Mario would say, OK, Category one. We can do this.
We can handle it, and it certainly surprised us as to how much water
damage is gonna happen.
And after the storm is finally gone, which it has. And we're still
in a tropical storm advisory. You were still in shelter in place.
Directives from the government. I know that the rain is still coming
down. Perhaps not as intentionally as it was just yesterday and earlier.
What are is your sense of the most immediate needs that people are
requiring right now.
I think access. I think there are people that are isolated due to
block roads, landslides, people that have been, uh, displaced from
their homes. Um Selena is one of the southern municipalities have
reported 2000 people that have had to leave their homes. So I think
access to whether it be essential food, water or medical services
is the most important.
Uh, component of this next 24 48 hours and direct relief is ready
to address that in the short and long term following the storm. And
what are you hearing? As far as power outages. We know that that
that Maria five years ago did incredible damage to the power grid
there and there was considerable outages.
It is power coming back on in certain places. It has. Um as of yesterday,
around this time 100% of Puerto Rico was without power. Um, the government
and the power company worked hard to reestablish power in critical
areas such as the medical center. What we call Central Medical in
Puerto Rico, which is the only tertiary hospital in the island. Um,
so that did get power back on around midnight last night, Um 70%
of Puerto Rico remains with
Help our today mostly dependent on generators, so there's still a
lot of work to be done. There's 750,000 people in Puerto Rico that
still have no water as well.
And we know that
Without access to fresh drinking water. That's one of the most threatening
things for human survivability.
That's correct, and not only that there's there's no what we call
the sector
sequel of not having access to clean water, which which are communicable
diseases such as leptospirosis, which we did see after Maria. There
was a report today warning the population or to drink water from
there that may have been touched by the dirty reverse, etcetera,
so it becomes a real crisis. I'm not only immediately put in the
upcoming weeks, and we know that we were just moments away from the
five year
Our anniversary of Maria doing such incredible damage.
And then this comes on top of it.
It seems like the rebuilding is going to be in the enormous job for
for weeks, months, years ahead.
Definitely, and I think it sheds. It highlights the importance of
when we think about rebuilding. We need to kind of do a little shifting
paradigms in terms of preparedness rather than
Thinking of preparedness and resiliency rather than just relief after
the storms, and I hope from this type of disaster, everybody learns
the lesson that direct relief has learned in the past five years
to make it so that we are better prepared and can withstand things
that we have no control over which is how often and how severe future
storms maybe in the face of climate change, etcetera. Alright, that
is Doctor Michele Carlo. Direct relief of Puerto Rico. Thank you
so much for being
I hear him.