FEMA outlines enhanced preparations for hurricane disaster recovery

Department of Homeland Security Under Secretary and head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency Michael D. Brown has announced FEMA’s new ‘Building on Success’ plan for the 2005 hurricane season. The plan details program evolutions that are now in place to help the Agency respond to the 2005 hurricane season and all future disasters.

“The unprecedented 2004 hurricane season tested our programs and systems like never before and we were able to react in an able and flexible way,” Brown said. “My ‘Building on Success’ plan outlines some of the specific areas where FEMA’s response and recovery operations evolved during the 2004 hurricane season to better serve disaster victims, and now we will be able to use these great evolutions for the 2005 hurricane season and all future disasters for years to come.”

With the official start to the 2005 hurricane season almost a month away, Brown stressed some of the great feats the Agency made in 2004 that will be used again in future disasters.

Highlights in ‘Building on Success’ include:

• The pre-positioning of disaster supplies which most states used for the first time during the 2004 hurricane season;
• The deployment of the National Disaster Medical System which treated more than 10,000 patients during the 2004 storms; and
• Disaster victims being able to apply for individual assistance from FEMA for the first time through the FEMA website.

For more information: www.fema.gov/hazards/hurricanes/hurinfo.shtm

•Date: 29th April 2005 • Region: N.America •Type: Article •Topic: DR general
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