Who you gonna call?
WHEN MOTHER NATURE UNLEASHES HER FULL FURY, AS
happened with Superstorm Sandy, who do you call for help? Who
keeps things moving?
That job falls primarily to the Federal Emergency Management
Agency, or FEMA. When disaster looms, the agency’s staff and volun-
teers swing into action. They fire up staging areas, coordinate with
local authorities, and generally get the ball rolling. While often
maligned, they do it better than anyone else. They also do it with a lot
of help from other federal, state, and local agencies, as well as volun-
teer groups like the Red Cross and, of course,
ALAN, the American Logistics Aid Network. As
FEMA administrator Craig Fugate notes, “It is a big
team effort.”
At its core, disaster relief is essentially logistics
management under very trying circumstances.
While the folks at FEMA leverage anything and
everything from a spectrum of sources to bring
relief to bear, FEMA relies heavily on the military.
Not just the National Guard, but the real live, no-
kidding combat logisticians who can step into the
middle of a war zone and keep supplies flowing.
To find out how the Department of Defense
answered the call from FEMA in the days after
Superstorm Sandy, we followed a thread all the way
back to the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA). As America’s combat
logistics support agency, the DLA provides nearly 100 percent of the
consumable items America’s military forces need to operate, from
food, fuel, and energy to uniforms, medical supplies, and construction equipment. It can keep things moving in the most trying of circumstances, up to and including war. So it’s natural that FEMA
would turn to DLA for support during times of crisis. In fact, there’s
a defined request mechanism in place for that, according to Army
Col. Roger McCreery, DLA’s Joint Logistics Operations Center
(JLOC) chief.
As of December, DLA had provided 6. 2 million meals, 72,000 liters
of bottled water, 172,500 blankets, 4,000 cots, and over 9 million gallons of fuel and heating oil to areas hard hit by Sandy. It also delivered
over 100 pumps to drain flooded areas, 50 generators to supply power
to vital installations, and 500 sets of cold weather clothing to keep
first responders going. The agency even brought in six portable X-ray
machines. And these are just a few of the highlights.
One of the most challenging problems faced
by combat logisticians is “the last tactical mile.”
How do you get the supplies to exactly where
they’re required, under the most trying of circumstances? Think about tanks in wartime.
How do you get fuel to where it is needed on the
front line?
Now, instead of tanks, think about getting fuel
to first responders in the middle of a disaster.
After Sandy, the commercial
delivery network for fuels collapsed—everyone saw the waiting lines on television—but the
ambulances and police cars still
needed to roll. That problem
fell squarely in DLA’s lap.
In the end, DLA delivered
over 800,000 gallons of fuel—
On Nov. 28, the Defense Logistics Agency’s
director, Navy Vice Adm. Mark Harnitchek, visited the DLA distribution site in New
Cumberland, Pa., to thank the staff for its post-Sandy relief efforts. “Whether it was meals to
West Virginia or to New York,” said Harnitchek,
“it all got there when you said it would get there.”
America, and especially those in coastal New
York and New Jersey, echoes the admiral’s thanks.
