October 26, 2012  

Tropical Storm Sandy is making its way up the East Coast over the next 120 hours and with its expected merger with a winter storm coming from the Great Lakes region, forecasters say we are looking at another massive October storm set to ravage New England and the East Coast.

ASSIST-U.S.® is ready to your support emergency response teams in these areas in the storm's aftermath with real-time, streaming video aerial imagery services. 

Please read on to learn how to secure these services in a timely manner, when they can be most effective.      

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Tropical Storm Sandy's Path

Preparing for Tropical Storm Sandy's landfall on the East Coast

Tropical Storm Sandy will move northward through the Bahamas on Friday, bringing tropical storm conditions to the east coast of Florida. Tropical storm conditions are possible in the Carolinas Saturday and Saturday night.  

Sandy is expected to turn toward the northeast on Saturday, followed by a turn to the northwest early next week, with direct impacts expected for the Mid-Atlantic or Northeast U.S.   

Your emergency response teams are already busy tracking Sandy's path and implementing your emergency preparedness plans in anticipation of the storm affecting your area. Whenever you deploy these teams in a storm's aftermath, performing post-storm damage assessment and triage are among the most difficult, dangerous and labor-intensive aspects of dealing with storms of this magnitude.

Real-time streaming aerial video imagery services can help with post-storm damage assessment and recovery operations    

Using a real-time streaming video imagery service immediately following a natural disaster can significantly help your emergency response field teams to efficiently direct their limited resources to the areas hardest hit and safely guide them around debris fields and other obstacles. If the 3G/4G networks go down, with advance notice and a signed service agreement, our alternate communication solution will allow you to continue transmitting visual data to your teams.  

These services are available upon request  

As of this writing, we have enough advance warning to stage our aircraft and flight crews outside the immediate path of the storm so that we can be on scene as soon as the storm has passed and it is safe to fly. Our operational teams are currently scheduling their deployment areas.

If you want to be included in our prestorm planning, please contact our Aviation Operations Director, Rick Bartle or Chief Pilot Richard Jackson (see contact information below), to be sure the proper contract documentation is in place. Having a signed disaster recovery agreement in place with us prior to the event allows you to receive 75% reimbursement of your post-storm recovery costs from FEMA. 

ASSIST-U.S.® Natural Disaster Response

This video, "Natural Disaster Response," provides an example of what our services can offer you, showing before and after views of last year's Springfield, MA, tornado damage area and the Vermont flooding from Hurricane Irene.   

View other examples of our post-storm damage assessment footage on our YouTube Channel (see link below) and on our website.  

 

Call now to secure your slot on the schedule!

Contact Rick Bartle, 603-533-1669 or Rich Jackson, 603-717-6839, as soon as possible to initiate your mission planning process.      

Carolyn Abbott, Director of Marketing Communications, is our emergency communications manager. If you are unable to reach Rick or Rich, please contact her at:

Carolyn Abbott: 978-621-9427 (m) or 978-874-2408 (land)

Carolyn will initiate the Master Service Agreement that puts your organization into our system, which allows her to make the necessary arrangements to get you into our mission queue. 

Sincerely,

Gerry Kobelski, CEO

ASSIST-U.S.   

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