Pa. urban rescue team in New England to assist with Henri flood response

• Katie Meyer/WHYY
  BioRecent Stories

  

  Katie Meyer is WHYY’s political reporter. Prior to coming to Philadelphia, Katie was WITF’s Capitol bureau chief, and covered all things state politics for public radio stations throughout Pennsylvania.
  
  Katie came to Harrisburg by way of New York City, where she worked at Fordham University’s public radio station, WFUV, as an anchor, general assignment reporter, and co-host of an original podcast. A 2016 graduate of Fordham, she won several awards for her work at WFUV, including four 2016 Gracies.
  
  Katie is a native New Yorker, though she originally hails from Troy, a little farther up the Hudson River. She can attest that the bagels are still pretty good there.

 Craig Ruttle / AP Photo

Waves pound the seawall in Montauk, N.Y., Sunday, Aug. 22, 2021, as Tropical Storm Henri affects the Atlantic coast.

Pennsylvania has deployed 16 members of its federal disaster response team to Connecticut to help with water rescues and other issues related to Tropical Storm Henri.

Henri hit a wide swath of the northeast this weekend, bringing heavy rain and threats of flooding in a number of states. In the Philadelphia region, New Jersey was especially hard-hit, with Central Jersey — particularly Middlesex County — bearing the brunt of the storm.

The response team, Pennsylvania Task Force One, is based in Philadelphia and is sponsored by the city’s fire department. It’s one of the 28 teams that the Federal Emergency Management Agency has positioned around the country for urban search-and-rescue needs.

They activated Saturday and were staged at Connecticut Fire Academy in Windsor Locks by Sunday. They remain there in case they’re needed as the storm weakens and moves back out to sea.

“I’m proud that Pennsylvanians have stepped up to assist with any water rescue efforts due to Tropical Storm Henri,” Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf said in a statement. “Water rescues are dangerous, so I’m grateful to these volunteers for answering the call to support communities who may be experiencing horrific flooding.”

Members of the task force, commonly called PA-TF1, also deployed to Surfside, Florida in the wake of a catastrophic condo collapse there that killed 98 people.

That assignment took 17 days of around-the-clock work, involving 12-hour split shifts, and changed from a rescue mission to a recovery mission after a few days spent sorting through rubble alongside other responders.

WHYY is the leading public media station serving the Philadelphia region, including Delaware, South Jersey and Pennsylvania. This story originally appeared on WHYY.org.

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