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The Puerto Rico Thread

Meadmaker

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Meadmaker
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Apr 27, 2004
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Hurricane Maria has left Puerto Rico in a complete mess.

According to an article I read, Puerto Rico has four power plants. Two of them are functional, but the transmission lines that take the power out of the plant are down. Two others suffered water damage and are non functional.

They have at least one hydropower dam.....that's the one you have probably seen news stories about. It hasn't collapsed yet, but they are still uncertain.

As best I can tell from the news, it has been five days, and literally no one is receiving electric power from the grid. It's all from generators, and fuel is scarce. 3.5 million people cannot live on an island of that size without electricity. This is a catastrophe of at least Katrina proportions, and probably worse.

As of today, there is no word yet on whether or not they stood during any playing of the national anthem.
 
I'll start the countdown: # of times Trump mentions Puerto Rico.

Last Tweet mention was on the 20th.
Governor @RicardoRossello-
We are with you and the people of Puerto Rico. Stay safe! #PRStrong
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On the 22nd he supposedly spoke with governors of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Trump said earlier Thursday that Puerto Rico was "absolutely obliterated" and the Virgin Islands were "flattened" by recent hurricanes Irma and Maria.

The entire island of Puerto Rico was left without power after Maria knocked out its already weakened electrical grid.

Trump said FEMA and other emergency responders are helping both U.S. territories begin the recovery process.

He says he'll visit Puerto Rico.
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Yeah, some of us were needling Cheeto Benito to look into what supplies were being sent to Puerto Rico. I kinda closed Twitter for a bit out of..angerpression?

Sounds like they're about...90% without power.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York visited - here's a link to what he said. You can let the autoplay (I know) keep going after it seems to stop. I thought Sen. Marco Rubio was going to fly in as well, but I've been away from news for a bit. Good news is it seems like they're getting some help. Bad news is, not nearly enough.

Even at the airport down there, sounded like chaos - supply planes being flown in, but little real coordination, Air Control out. And those are the tourists. Plus, likely quite a few more looking to get out.

The big problem near that dam, as far as I can tell, is that they have one AM station left on the island that cuts in and out, and no other way to tell those nearby to evacuate.

I'm an electrical engineer, not civil, but my guess is that, for the most vulnerable people, the more immediate need may not be food, but rather clean water (with cooling and medicine also being vital). Please, do not hold me to that, ever. But in any case, this is likely a good place to send in the US Navy.


Hopefully, now that Maria's starting to move up the coast, they can start moving in full force. I hope the folks on the ground there are getting info out ASAP, and that the Joint Chiefs are prepared to put together a serious plan to aid as many people as possible.
 
The amount of supplies that can be airlifted is dwarfed by what can be delivered by ship. But are any harbor facilities sufficiently intact to allow this? And then of course one needs roads to distribute those supplies.

This is really a case where the military has the expertise and equipment to help. They need to be assigned this task and fully supported by the rest of the USA government ASAP.
 
I work for the U.S. Forest Service. We were told a few days ago that now that the Western U.S. is finally getting some cooler and wetter weather, the wildland fire situation is getting down to a reasonable level.

This means some fire crews and incident management teams can now be shifted from fires to hurricane relief.

It's not a huge thing, but at least there is some good strong, organized grunt labor moving in. They can clear brush and debris from roads, ditches, power lines and other infrastructure. They can set up and operate helicopter bases. They can camp out if no shelter is available. The incident management teams are probably more helpful. They can coordinate a wide range of emergency responses by police, fire, rescue, and even national guard. I know some of the fire crews communicate in Spanish, and I think at least one of the Incident Management teams can as well.

Still, that's just short term. Puerto Rico is going to need months, or a year or more just to get basic infrastructure (water, sewer, and electricity) going - That will include temporary fixes.

It's going to take years or decades of heavy investment to get everything back to pre-hurricane conditions. I don't know when we'll ever get politicians supportive of that into power.

The comment about aircraft not being able to match ships is dead on, even before one factors in how idiotic we can be about what to carry on planes. The U.S. made a show of helping Mexico after the recent earthquake by flying in a few cargo planes mostly loaded with bottled water. I can't imagine a more inefficient use of aircraft. Not a nice portable water purification plant, just a bunch of pallets of bottled water - for one of the largest cities in the world. I figure they probably had about one pint for every two or three hundred people.
 
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Something Trump may have overlooked. Puerto Ricans are of course full Americam citizens. They can move anywhere else in the USA they wish any time they wish, with no visa required. If Puerto Rica remains uninhabitable they will leave the island in high numbers and relocate to any of the 50 States. I hope they will choose the Red states that they can flip to Blue.

Donald- think about all those Spanish speakers coming to live, work, and vote (at least once they are here long enough to establish local residency). Perhaps your own self interest, if not humanitarian considerations, would justify ramping up rebuilding efforts?
 
Giordano said:
The amount of supplies that can be airlifted is dwarfed by what can be delivered by ship. But are any harbor facilities sufficiently intact to allow this? And then of course one needs roads to distribute those supplies.
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The US navy has 9 amphibious assault ships that can load and airlift an entire Marine battalion if they have to, plus 10 amphibious transport docks which can operate Ospreys and land amphibious units which can be, if necessary, loaded with stuff other than military vechiles. They should have enough lifting capacity between them to significantly ease the problems on the island. Marine engineers should be able to build a few temporary ports within 48 hours if necessary.

As far as I know Nimitz-class carriers are equipped to function as movable power plants if the need arises, they did it during the Indian ocean tsunami IIRC. US has another 10 of those, I'm sure the navy can spare one for a week.

In short, Trump has all the tools necessary to truly make a difference in Puerto Rico and no excuse not to help out. It's a US territory FFS, not even a foreign country.

McHrozni
 
Giordano said:
Something Trump may have overlooked. Puerto Ricans are of course full Americam citizens. They can move anywhere else in the USA they wish any time they wish, with no visa required. If Puerto Rica remains uninhabitable they will leave the island in high numbers and relocate to any of the 50 States. I hope they will choose the Red states that they can flip to Blue.
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Texas and Florida.

Florida is obvious, but Trump won Texas by a measly 600,000 votes. Add in two million Puerto Ricans who now hate his guts and Texas is blue come 2020. Someone should tell him that I suppose. Or don't tell him that and see him try to explain how he lost Texas of all places.

McHrozni
 
Just when I think The PDJT can't get any more assholy, he gets assholier. (re: his first tweets about Puerto Rico that they owe a lot of money).
 
McHrozni said:
In short, Trump has all the tools necessary to truly make a difference in Puerto Rico and no excuse not to help out. It's a US territory FFS, not even a foreign country.

McHrozni
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He does, and IMO it's still a touch early to criticise him too heavily on the grounds that it's not entirely clear what should be being done.

That said, there are probably a number of reasons why President Trump may be inclined to drag his feet:

  • He may not be fully aware of the status of Puerto Rico and the Puerto Ricans. He may think they are just more illegals
  • The sums required to help Puerto Rico are enormous, especially when the existing debt is taken into account. I suspect that the President is unwilling to bail out the Puerto Ricans because it could turn into a money pit
  • Puerto Ricans lean Democrat, so why help them at all
  • Thery're all a bit swarthy, helping them will not endear him to his base.
 
The Don said:
He does, and IMO it's still a touch early to criticise him too heavily on the grounds that it's not entirely clear what should be being done.

That said, there are probably a number of reasons why President Trump may be inclined to drag his feet:

He may not be fully aware of the status of Puerto Rico and the Puerto Ricans. He may think they are just more illegals
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Hehe :) Yes, possible.

The sums required to help Puerto Rico are enormous, especially when the existing debt is taken into account. I suspect that the President is unwilling to bail out the Puerto Ricans because it could turn into a money pit
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We aren't talking about their debt problem, but the problems caused by the collapse of infrastructure caused by a category 5 hurricane. I can understand the unwillingness to foot their bills, I even agree with it to a fair extent, but we're talking about a situation where three out of five power plants will be out of commission for months, the other two are also inoperable, clean water is scarce ... it's a humanitarian disaster in the making. US president is supposed to handle these sorts of things regardless of where they happen, but this time it's on American soil.

Puerto Ricans lean Democrat, so why help them at all

Thery're all a bit swarthy, helping them will not endear him to his base.
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Helping them in a meaningful way to weather this disaster would go a long way towards fixing his image among people who are neither his base nor democrat base. He could be in real trouble in 2020 even if Puerto Rico doesn't turn out to be his Katrina.

McHrozni
 
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McHrozni said:
We aren't talking about their debt problem, but the problems caused by the collapse of infrastructure caused by a category 5 hurricane. I can understand the unwillingness to foot their bills, I even agree with it to a fair extent, but we're talking about a situation where three out of five power plants will be out of commission for months, the other two are also inoperable, clean water is scarce ... it's a humanitarian disaster in the making. US president is supposed to handle these sorts of things regardless of where they happen, but this time it's on American soil.
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Spending any money there may look to President Trump and his supporters as throwing good money after bad.

It may very well be a humanitarian disaster in the making, but it's a humanitarian disaster that isn't apparently in President Trump's interest to do a whole hell of a lot about.

McHrozni said:
Helping them in a meaningful way to weather this disaster would go a long way towards fixing his image among people who are neither his base nor democrat base. He could be in real trouble in 2020 even if Puerto Rico doesn't turn out to be his Katrina.

McHrozni
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The trouble comes if it damages his image among his base. Attracting some support is only a good thing if he doesn't risk support elsewhere. Right now he's likely thinking that he's on a win-win. The only people suffering are those who either can not or will not vote for him in 2020 and meanwhile he's not having to spend money - the GOP loves not spending money on the less wealthy, preferring to save it for rebates for those that need it most - multimillionaires :D
 
The Don said:
Spending any money there may look to President Trump and his supporters as throwing good money after bad.

It may very well be a humanitarian disaster in the making, but it's a humanitarian disaster that isn't apparently in President Trump's interest to do a whole hell of a lot about.
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It is rather short-sighted policy :)

The trouble comes if it damages his image among his base. Attracting some support is only a good thing if he doesn't risk support elsewhere. Right now he's likely thinking that he's on a win-win. The only people suffering are those who either can not or will not vote for him in 2020 and meanwhile he's not having to spend money - the GOP loves not spending money on the less wealthy, preferring to save it for rebates for those that need it most - multimillionaires :D
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His base amounts to about 25% of the country, if that much. Even a marginal increase in voter participation among his opponents, even without a corresponding decrease among his non-base supporters, would spell trouble for him.

McHrozni
 
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alfaniner said:
Just when I think The PDJT can't get any more assholy, he gets assholier. (re: his first tweets about Puerto Rico that they owe a lot of money).
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Hey the laws were written to favor the banks instead of those Puerto Rico. They have far less favorable rules than states do. Given how much trump personally ows big banks he is not going to go against their interest, they might call in some of the loans he can't pay back.
 
Looking at Katrina, it was incredibly obvious that the governmental response at all levels, especially federal and local, was just a disaster. I could watch the news and see that it was obvious that things ought to be done, but weren't. There were a few thousand people without water and sanitation, a few miles away from places that had it. It was pretty obvious that Brownie was not doing a heckuva job.

For Puerto Rico, it's less obvious to me. I can't look and say, "Get something in there and reconnect those wires" because I don't know exactly what it takes to reconnect a high tension line located on an island. Also, I find the news coverage isn't very good. They are focused on showing people in distress, but not very good at showing what really needs to happen to get them out of distress.

So, I'm not absolutely certain that the governmental response is lacking. It just seems to me that there ought to be a way to get one power plant back on line, and get the electricity to the capital if nowhere else. If it takes six months to get every last village back on line, that seems bad, but maybe understandable or forgivable. The fact that five days in there is no "regular" power flowing seems like a real crisis that demands a response, and it seems like it ought to be possible to make that happen.
 
Meadmaker said:
So, I'm not absolutely certain that the governmental response is lacking. It just seems to me that there ought to be a way to get one power plant back on line, and get the electricity to the capital if nowhere else. If it takes six months to get every last village back on line, that seems bad, but maybe understandable or forgivable. The fact that five days in there is no "regular" power flowing seems like a real crisis that demands a response, and it seems like it ought to be possible to make that happen.
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It's not just possible, it's been done half way around the world 12 years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Unified_Assistance
http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=16477

McHrozni
 
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