SC ready to send help to flood-ravaged Texas

South Carolina emergency responders are on standby and ready to help, if requested, in areas of Texas ravaged by flooding from Hurricane Harvey.

Requests for assistance, including firefighting and medical personnel, are made through the state emergency management agencies, according to Derrec Becker, spokesman for the S.C. Emergency Management Division. So far, Texas emergency officials have not requested help from South Carolina.

Nearly 60 South Carolina volunteers with the American Red Cross were en route to Texas on Monday to help provide shelter and food, according to Rebecca Jordan, executive director of the Central S.C. office of the American Red Cross.

“They'll be doing a variety of things,” she said. “Right now sheltering is our priority – helping people as they're coming in, giving them a safe, dry place to land and providing food, comfort and hope to them.”

Jordan said the Red Cross in South Carolina sent four of its emergency response vehicles to Texas but is keeping the remaining two vehicles in the Palmetto State, where forecasters are waiting to see if a low-pressure system in the Atlantic develops into Tropical Storm Irma.

“We need to be prepared, just in case,” she said.

The S.C. Baptist Convention will likely send a mobile kitchen and feeding unit to Texas, according to Sue Harmon, operations manager for disaster relief for the convention. A fully-staffed mobile kitchen is capable of serving up to 10,000 meals per day, Harmon said, adding that feeding and child care units were the primary requests from Texas Baptists.

“There’s some possibilities,” she said of the help they can lend. “But it’s still raining over there. Things are still being worked out as far as what the needs are.”

This story was originally published August 28, 2017 at 4:34 PM with the headline "SC ready to send help to flood-ravaged Texas."