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Planning Never Ceases: Hurricane Response Prep Takes Years-Long Focus
By Thomas Ehlers, Staff Writer
June 1 is a highlighted date among many circles, as each year it signifies the start of the Atlantic Hurricane season.
But the calendar doesn’t mean much for engineers across the Sunshine State; it’s merely a point of reference to shift resources towards increased readiness from the months and years of preparation for the potential of hurricanes.
Engineers have long played a role in the preparation and response to natural disasters, including hurricanes, and Florida is no exception.
“The State of Florida is very prepared," said Miguel Torres Diaz, vice president for federal programs within WSP, “We work directly with the Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM), and we have other divisions that work with the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT). Florida has one of the best readiness structures in the nation, and we are fortunate to be able to support the state of Florida in that respect under the partnership we hold.”
WSP holds a number of contracts, including ones with FDEM, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and more, several of which focus on deploying and assisting with power restoration and repair efforts in storm regions. The company’s contracts allow it to work with local officials up to the national level in the state.
Torres Diaz spoke to the close relationship between his firm and government entities, an important factor when responding to disasters, particularly those with moving parts and multiple stakeholders.
“It has to be a government-private sector partnership and collaboration where we are working as one.” Torres Diaz said. “There has to be a level of commitment –a commitment to service.”
That service is best exemplified through the months of preparation before hurricane season. Chase Anderson, an associate principal at Thornton Tomasetti, noted the training during the year. With technical expertise in forensic and structural engineering, along with property loss consulting, he held a training session last year for responding engineers, highlighting specific tools for storm evaluation and safety tips across the spectrum.
“You’d be surprised how many engineers coming from college who haven’t climbed on a roof before,” Anderson said. “Even down to the basics of setting up a ladder, we teach them to be safe, how to get off the roof.”
Torres Diaz echoed the multiple learning opportunities implemented for the next season, tests of updated technology, and completion of tabletop exercises.
“Most of this training process is completed during blue skies, so when the event comes, you aren’t trying to learn on the fly,” he said. “You want to be ready. You want to have exercises. You want to walk through the process.”
A Large Scale Operation
When a tropical storm is in the Atlantic Ocean or approaches the Gulf, Anderson calls upon individuals from his firm across the state and country to verify availability and build out a team. For Anderson’s purposes, the response time won’t be as critical.
“After a storm, there are limited resources available between power, water, food, etc., that are needed by the first responders,” Anderson said. “We typically won’t need to be there until a week or two after the storm, and by that time, people start getting back to look at their property.”
But for WSP, some of the firm’s services require a more urgent timeline, so it produces daily – if not afternoon and evening – reports to prepare its engineers.
“Projects might be similar but they aren’t the same,” Torres Diaz said. “Every disaster is unique, and every disaster requires a mindset approach that engineer-trained people are used to doing. We do have to react and address something in a particular or strategic way, and I think my engineering background has helped me to understand an order and to break down the challenge into pieces that can be digested and attacked in order to solve it.”
During Hurricane Ian, Torres Diaz performed immediate logistics support, providing generators, pumps, technicians and engineers to parts of the state. During Helene and Milton, he was stationed in Tallahassee and Marianna, directing equipment deployment, including generator deployment to schools and hospitals, using his logistics experience to serve.
After hurricanes, some WSP engineers complete bridge inspections in accordance with National Bridge Inspection requirements. Its team has cleared 500 bridges in less than 10 days. Its engineers can complete a number of services, including debris management, utilizing its network to serve the public.
“It takes a lot of preparedness, awareness and a sense of committed service when you are called upon,” Torres Diaz said. “I think we have the flexibility at WSP that allows us to really move horizontally and vertically when we need to and even pool resources when we are required too.”
USACE and its engineers engage in a host of emergency operations in the immediate aftermath of hurricanes across the state. Hurricanes are only one type of disaster the USACE responds to, but in every instance, the organization’s top priorities are to save lives, protect property and support immediate emergency response priorities across federal agencies.
Every storm and situation is different, so USACE offers a series of programs and support, including providing emergency power. Through its Emergency Power Planning and Response teams throughout the country, USACE can partner with contractors or the 249th Engineering Battalion to assess emergency power requirements and capabilities of emergency generation equipment, install, operate and maintain emergency power during an event and uninstall emergency power after the normal power grid is operational.
Debris management is another key service USACE offers. Assigned by FEMA, USACE can complete direct assistance to remove right-of-way, emergency, private property and waterway debris, offer technical assistance to local governments, or provide oversight for state or local operations. It also operates Operation Blue Roof through FEMA, which provides temporary covering to roofs of eligible homes damaged in storms in order to prevent future damage.
Boots On The Ground
Completing post-storm structure assessments is a large role many engineers play. Torres Diaz noted WSP’s Housing Inspection Services (HIS), a FEMA-related service featuring over 1,000 resources for initial validation for damage to a company, ensuring fraud is limited.
Engineers at Thornton Tomasetti, WSP and other firms complete housing inspection services, a FEMA-related program that provides property assessments after hurricanes. Thornton Tomasetti’s approach as a firm with work across the engineering spectrum allows them to utilize structure assessments for enhancing future work.
“We design them, we oversee the construction of them, and we do investigations for them,“ Anderson said. “Every part, from its origination to its life to an untimely demise, we have engineers that can oversee that whole process. It gives a holistic view of what works and what doesn’t.”
The inspection process begins with a focus on the building envelope – roof, walls, etc. The focus then shifts to interior structural damage, an aspect that can be limited due to safety concerns. Newer technology like drones can be used to safely inspect the interior and top of structures.
Enhanced scrutiny is critical to ensure problem points are correctly identified, Anderson said.
“One thing I enjoy about the job is I’ve done many, many roof inspections in my life, but every time I see something new,” Anderson said. “That could be due to the nature of construction, it could be something about the way the building was maintained or its ultimate use, or it also could be wind damage, which can do some crazy stuff you wouldn’t think was possible.”
Thornton Tomasetti engineers prepare a findings report after storm deployments, which is shared across the firm’s locations. These reports not only inform seasoned engineers but also train young engineers in the expected work product and logic behind evaluations. Anderson noted several lessons learned from last year’s active storm season.
“One thing I noticed was a lot of the buildings that had been properly repaired following Hurricane Ian did very well during Hurricane Milton,” Anderson said. “The building codes we have in Florida are very resilient and work assuming the construction is done appropriately and per code.
“The flip side is that a handful of buildings I inspected that had brand new roofs put on in recent years, but they still failed massively and had a lot of damage to the interior as a result. When I looked at them closer, I realized the work done by those contractors was subpar.”
Making A Difference
No matter who the client is – an insurance company, a property owner, a government entity or otherwise – an engineer’s response also touches an engineer’s call to service.
“It’s a profession that the public respects – most people tend to listen to you and value you,” Anderson said. “There’s a flip side of the coin. Society puts a lot of trust in us as engineers, so we need to deliver on that and do our best so the Florida we live in is a happy, healthy, safe place to live for everyone.”
That service piece is particularly true for Torres Diaz. Before Hurricane Maria in 2017, he lived with his family in Puerto Rico where he worked on infrastructure for a number of years, but the cyclone drove him to a more pinpointed career trajectory.
"I decided to change my path, not just build more bridges and stuff and stuff and stuff,” said Torres Diaz. “I wanted to focus on how I could go more to the basics, to service, to reach people with real need. I could apply engineering knowledge from my infrastructure experience in the aftermath and during the response of events.”
As the 2025 hurricane season quickly approaches, engineers like Anderson and Torres Diaz will continue to train and be ready for the coming storms. Torres Diaz spoke to the importance of the work engineers do surrounding hurricanes, but he acknowledged the need for more engineers in disaster work – and hopes to encourage others to join.
“Sometimes we are so focused on the projects and computers and the systems,” Torres Diaz said. “Disasters will continue to occur, and those of us who have lived a little more in our careers understand there is a gap, a need for more engineers to be involved in these services.
“At the end of the day, it is an extension of an engineer’s ethical responsibility with their communities to support, rebuild and bring them back to normalcy.”
