With Hurricane Earl moving up the East Coast and expected to arrive in New England by tonight, FEMA is taking aggressive actions to coordinate with Northeastern states as they prepare for possible severe weather.  Initial reports from our teams in North Carolina and Virginia indicate that the storm passed close to them without causing the level of damage that it could have, but we still don’t know what Earl’s impact will be in the Northeast United States.  Earl is still a potentially dangerous storm, and it’s important for residents in the region to continue to take this storm seriously and to get ready.
 
Yesterday, our Deputy Administrator Rich Serino, who has 35 years of emergency management experience in Massachusetts, deployed to Boston to oversee our preparation and response efforts.  FEMA teams have been on the ground since earlier this week along the East Coast, including Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine to work directly with and support state and local officials. We also have teams on standby in New York and New Jersey, ready to help if needed. We have pre-positioned commodities for rapid delivery in Massachusetts, including water, meals, tarps, and generators, and at the direction of President Obama we are bringing together all of our federal partners to ensure a swift and effective response if needed. Our goal throughout all of these efforts is simple – we want to do everything we can to keep our residents and communities safe, and prevent the loss of life and property.

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