COLUMBIA -- South Carolina is already making preparations for Hanna. The state’s Emergency Operations Center has been activated on a limited basis.
Wednesday morning at 6 a.m., it will be activated fully, with state agencies there around the clock. Emergency Management spokesman Derrec Becker says the state does have the manpower and resources it needs to react to the storm. If there is anything we need that we don’t have, procedures are in place to ask for assistance from other states.
Emergency Management is also ready to implement the state’s plan to reverse traffic to speed up the evacuation process, if necessary. During the evacuation before Hurricane Floyd in 1999, traffic was bumper-to-bumper from Charleston all the way to Columbia. Because of that, some drivers ran out of gas along the way and gas stations ran low or ran out. That disastrous evacuation led to the lane-reversal plan.
“We also have a refueling plan, in which the major fuel suppliers for South Carolina have agreed to supply certain gas stations along the evacuation route with fuel so they won’t run out,” Becker says.
National Guard spokesman Col. Pete Brooks says the state has more than twice as many guardsmen in the state than are called for in the state’s emergency response plan. It calls for 5,000 soldiers and the state has 9,550 members of the Army Guard and 1,200 members of the Air Guard in state. Only 250 members are deployed right now.
He also says the Guard has all the equipment it needs except for Blackhawk helicopters. We have only two here, but could ask for more from other states if needed.
Gov. Sanford is at the Republican National Convention but is getting briefings and updates from the Emergency Management Division throughout the day. He says the 5 a.m. forecast Wednesday could bring him back to the state, even though he’s scheduled to speak at the convention Thursday. “If I think that South Carolina looks to be in harm’s way, I’m coming home,” Sanford said.
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