Hurricane Harvey: 40% of small businesses don't survive these events, Russel Honore says
Former Joint Task Force Katrina Commander Russel Honore on the rescue and recovery process from Hurricane Harvey.
The rescue operations are underway as rainfall pounds southern Texas from Hurricane Harvey. Former Joint Task Force Katrina Commander Russel Honore told the FOX Business Network’s Dagen McDowell, of Mornings with Maria, “It’s going to get worse before it gets better. At the same time the good Samaritans, what we call in Louisiana the ‘Cajun Navy,’ citizens have stepped up and after every disaster, regardless of what people tell you, more people are saved by neighbors and citizens than they are by first responders.”
When asked if he was in touch with federal officials about the response to Hurricane Harvey, he said his response is to “scale it up.”
“In terms of scale, we had 40,000 National Guard troops in Katrina…we had 20,000 federal troops, over 245 helicopters and B-5s…right now this is a lot bigger area, a lot more people than Katrina and the challenge is going to be bigger.”
According to Honore getting the electrical grid back quickly is key to rebuilding in Houston and getting the infrastructure supporting the city’s energy sector up and running.
“A lot of these small, rural areas did not take the grid down, so you watched over the weekend and transformers popping and when that happens that entire system has to be built.”
The speed in getting electricity back is key to the area’s small businesses and economy as well.
“You know the old numbers, 40% of small businesses don’t survive these events because the grid doesn’t come up, they don’t have the workers and the people that they used to work for are not open. So the quicker they can find a model to get businesses up, the quicker people can get back and get the schools up. But we’ve got to find a different way of doing it.”