You’re a public-works superintendent in a small city that has just been hit by a hurricane. Electric lines are down all over town and for miles around. Grid power to run your sewage lift stations went out during the storm and will remain that way for days. You’ve asked the federal government for assistance, but it won’t be forthcoming until the bureaucrats finish studying the damage. What would you do?

Andrew S. “Andy” Maddox, wastewater plant supervisor in Wauchula, FL, called for help after Hurricane Charley swept across southwest Florida on August 13, 2004. His portable-generator distributor, David West, vice president of Alternative Power Sources in Plant City, 50 miles away, relayed the request to Wayne Everhart, superintendent of Plant City Utilities. Everhart responded with portable generators and the staff to install them, helping to avert a public-health crisis until Tampa Electric Co. (TECO) could restore grid power to Wauchula.

PHOTO: ANDY MADDOX

A portable generator powers a wastewater lift station in Wauchula, FL.

In this drama of post-hurricane desperation, Maddox, West, and Everhart weren’t the only stars. A large cast of players from other communities up, down, and across the state also came to Wauchula’s aid.

What makes Wauchula’s story worth telling—apart from its sheer human interest—is the concept it suggests for cooperative regional networks organized to mobilize and deploy portable generators quickly to power basic municipal services after a hurricane or other disaster.

In the Eye of the Storm
Wauchula (from a Miccosukee Indian word, Wa-tu-la-ha-kee, meaning “call of the sandhill crane”), sprouted up around a Florida Southern Railway depot built in 1886 on high ground a half-mile west of the Peace River. The city incorporated in 1902. It’s the seat of Hardee County, covers 1.5 square miles, and has a population of 4,366. Wauchula’s utility department operates its own water and wastewater treatment plants, which also serve subdivisions outside the city limits. Seven full-time employees are responsible for the treatment plants and 19 lift stations.

Wauchula’s utility department has a hurricane plan that it updates annually. “We know our jobs,” Maddox says. “We purchase fresh supplies every year and top off our gas and diesel fuel when a storm approaches.

“Charley came through in about three hours, reaching gusts of 140 to 150 miles per hour while moving over us at 20 to 22 miles per hour. Immediately afterwards, the Hardee County EOC [Emergency Operations Center] contacted the Hillsborough County EOC in Tampa. Hillsborough and other surrounding counties sent police officers to patrol Hardee.

“Everyone had a cell phone. Our Nextel phone service connection was lost early and the two-way was so busy it was hard to get through. It would be months before our two-way radios would be back in service. Hillsborough County’s EOC set up temporary communications towers for the Wauchula area the next day, and we acquired Alltel cell phones that worked with the Alltel’s own towers.”

Having quick phone service helped Maddox and his supervisor, Ray McClellan. Wauchula’s superintendent of public works, reach other cities and agencies to request help.

Plant Generators Worked
Fortunately, Wauchula’s water and wastewater treatment plants survived the storm, and the emergency generators installed at those plants were adequate to operate them.

The water plant has a 10-year-old 275 kW Caterpillar diesel generator with a 250-gallon fuel tank. The wastewater plant has a 14-year-old, 300 kW Onan diesel generator with a 300-gallon fuel tank. The Onan generator also provides lighting for Wauchula’s supply warehouse, and powers the pumps that supply service vehicles with diesel fuel and gasoline.

With tanks holding about 2,500 gallons of diesel fuel, the utility department had an ample supply of fuel. “It takes about 300 gallons to run our generators under full load for six days,” Maddox says. “We can pump additional fuel through pipes to our generators. We also have a portable 300-gallon diesel tank we can put on skids on the back of a truck to refuel portable generators.”

Also equipped with a permanent generator—a 100 kW Caterpillar diesel with a 300-gallon fuel tank—is lift station #3, which collects wastewater from most of the west side of town.

Each of these generators operates for an hour a week under full load to keep them ready at all times for emergency use. “Our maintenance programs paid off,” Maddox says. “We now appreciate why we spend so much money on service.”

Generators on Loan
Wauchula has a total of 19 sewage lift stations, but 18 of them lack permanent generators. The city also owns three portable generators obtained through the Emergency Management Preparedness and Assistance Trust Fund (see sidebar).“The challenge was how we were going to pump all these stations with three portable pumps,” says Maddox.

That challenge almost immediately became insurmountable, because Maddox had to relinquish two of the portable generators. One went to provide power to the city-owned electric utility’s warehouse. (Wauchula owns its power lines, maintains them with its own line crews, and distributes grid power purchased from TECO.)

Maddox loaned the other portable generator to Grimsley Oil Co., a bulk diesel and gasoline dealer that supplies the City of Wauchula and Hardee County. Grimsley lacked a generator to operate its pumps, so the city-owned generator was installed at Grimsley’s bulk plant at the north end of town to pump diesel fuel and gasoline for all of the firm’s customers. Grimsley used the city’s generator for two and a half weeks, until grid power was restored there.

Grimsley’s corporate office, at a separate location, was without grid power for two weeks. “We purchased a Honda 3000 gasoline generator from Central Florida Yamaha in Lake Placid to operate our computers and phones,” says Charles Grimsley, the company’s president and owner.“ It wasn’t big enough for our lights or the air conditioning. At the end of each workday we dismantled it and brought it inside to protect it from theft.

“We have been in business for 38 years and never before needed a generator. Now we’re weighing our future options. There has been some talk of our acquiring a generator for the bulk plant through a State of Florida generator-assistance program for designated bulk wholesalers and service stations. Such a program is under discussion in Tallahassee, but I don’t know if it will pass.”

Two issues concern Grimsley:

• The local EOC office never included his company in its planning, and had no idea what his generator requirements were or how the community might depend on his services.
• A state tourism-promotion scheme helped to create a fuel shortage just before Hurricane Charley struck. In July, an $0.08 moratorium on state gasoline taxes encouraged everyone—tourists and Floridians alike—to fill their tanks, stretching supplies statewide. The distribution system had not yet recovered when it was stressed anew by evacuations and pre-storm fill-ups. Many retail service stations and bulk distribution centers ran out of fuel.

“The City of Wauchula did us and the community a great favor when they loaned us one of their generators,” Grimsley says. “We kept them supplied with fuel to run their emergency vehicles. In addition, Wauchula residents and relief workers needed fuel for their cars, trucks, generators, and other equipment. We opened up to the retail public when we could—on a cash-only basis, because we’re not set up to take credit cards.”

Lift-Station Woes
With one portable generator left to power 18 lift stations, Wauchula’s utility department struggled to cope. The day after the storm—a Saturday—everyone was still in shock. “At first, two-man crews worked around the clock with our one portable generator to service the lift stations. It about killed them,” Maddox says.

Two of the 18 lift stations have single-phase 230-V power and can run on a 5.5 kW home-sized generator. “I bought two of these generators off the shelf at Lowe’s,” says Maddox. “They are easy to service but we had to physically crank them up.” He was lucky to find them. Most home-supply stores had such generators on order with a 60- to 90-day wait for delivery, as hurricane-spawned demand stretched manufacturers’ resources thin for generators and most other building supplies.

The other 16 lift stations have a three-phase design requiring at least a 25-kW generator, with a high leg of 270 V and two lesser legs of about 120 V. Hardee County EOC tried to get help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), but that didn’t happen, Maddox says. While FEMA’s staff mobilized at a deliberate pace to evaluate the situation, local public-works directors found working cell phones and began to call one another. The result was a serendipitous pooling and sharing of resources all over central Florida.

On Monday, August 16, Maddox called West, from whom Wauchula had acquired its three portable generators. West in turn contacted Everhart at Plant City Utilities, which serves that city’s 31,714 residents.

“They were trying to find generator power anywhere they could,” Everhart says. “We took three of our portable generators down to Wauchula to move around to their lift stations.”

Water Pipe Repairs
The next day, McClellan called Everhart to ask another favor. Could Plant City send help to repair Wauchula’s water and sewer lines, torn from the ground when the hurricane toppled and uprooted huge trees?

Wauchula’s water department maintains in-ground water pipes, but its crews were swamped. Riverview Heights, a subdivision of 500 homes east of Wauchula, buys its utility services from Wauchula. Everhart sent a crew to replace 1,000 feet of eight-inch T900 plastic PVC water pipe on the Wednesday after the storm. “It took 14 long, continuous hours—not something we would typically try to do in a day—without interrupting our own work in Plant City. Everyone just put in long hours,” Everhart says.

“Plant City crews cooked for us, and helped us get food and clothing for families without any,” Maddox recounts. “They sent a debris collection truck and close to 30 Plant City employees to help out for most of a month. We will always be grateful to the kind people in Plant City for their generous personal and municipal support of our community.

“After I begged them to put a price on their help and supplies, they finally guessed it was in the neighborhood of $35,000—a significant contribution for a medium-sized town to help another, smaller community. I asked for a bill to submit to FEMA. I know it was turned in. I don’t know if it has been paid.”

Plant City’s response was an informal act of kindness, performed without signed contracts or agreements, at no cost to Wauchula. Plant City hopes to be reimbursed by FEMA, but if FEMA doesn’t pay, “we will have to eat our costs,” Everhart says.

Casting a Wider Net
Meanwhile, FEMA continued to promise additional generators for Wauchula’s remaining lift stations and other installations requiring generator support. When they didn’t arrive, Maddox, McClellan, and West began calling other central Florida communities spared by Hurricane Charley to ask for emergency equipment and manpower.

PHOTO: ANDY MADDOX

Wauchula’s staff used a trailer-mounted Caterpillar engine they own that runs a Gorman-Rupp pump, and connected it to one lift station. “It required service, and we blocked it in so it couldn’t be stolen,” Maddox says.

At West’s suggestion, Plant City sent three Tradewind portable generators like those Wauchula owned, and several crews to install them at three lift stations.

At this point, seven of the 19 lift stations had generator power. Then Everhart assigned some Plant City workers to drive around and pump the remaining 12 lift stations, giving the Wauchula crews some much-needed rest.

Chastain Skillman, the Tampa engineering firm that designed Wauchula’s new wastewater reclamation project, sent a 150 kW generator to run the pumps on the city’s drinking-water wellfield.

West sent the city of Bowling Green two portable generators from a Hardee County phosphate company to use at their wastewater treatment plant.

Inspector Chris Medley, of Chastain-Skillman Inc., also started calling friends. He found an elderly 25 kW portable generator at Polk County Utilities that was attached to one of Wauchula’s lift stations.

“The City of Bartow was hit hard by Hurricane Charley, but it still sent us a portable Tradewind generator like ours that we installed at one of our lift stations,” says Maddox. “Bartow’s supervisor of wastewater, Connie Adcock, is a long-time personal friend. She called me to ask what I needed, then sent her 40-kW generator and an electrician to wire it to a lift station.”

Adcock also arranged with Randy Wilkerson, the wastewater supervisor in Chiefland, to loan Wauchula a portable generator that Chiefland had sent to Bartow. Her electrician wired that generator to another lift station.

Thursday afternoon—almost a week after the storm—the Hardee County EOC realized that FEMA wasn’t going to deliver the generators Wauchula needed, and rented seven 25 kW generators from NationsRent West Inc.

“We put these generators on our trailer and installed them at more of our lift stations,” says Maddox “We used our portable diesel-fuel tank to refill them.”

At this point most of the Wauchula lift stations had their own generators, easing the pressure on the rotating portable generator and its crew.

More Ill Wind
Charley was the first of four hurricanes to strike Florida in 2004. Ivan missed Wauchula, but Frances arrived on September 4, dropping 5.5 inches of rain as winds reached 45 mph. TECO power was off for eight hours.

“We had given back several of our borrowed generators, but we still had the rental units, so we had to pull a portable generator around for a couple of hours,” Maddox says.

Hurricane Jeanne, on September 25, brought another episode of rain and wind, and an 11-hour TECO power outage. After Jeanne, Wauchula became a donor to other hard-hit communities.

“On September 27,” Maddox reports, “we picked up all of our generators, shared three of those rented for us with Bowling Green, and sent a staff member to wire them. The next day we loaned some of our own generators to Auburndale, 50 miles north of us, which was hit hard by power outages and flooding. They used our portable generators for about a week and a half.”

In the end, Maddox says, Wauchula received one FEMA generator but gave it back to Hardee County. “We never got assistance from FEMA when we needed it,” he says. “We nearly killed employees by having them move portable generators from lift station to lift station.”

Everhart says an important lesson he learned was how exhausted and burned out people became from working long hours. “People worked so hard they were not thinking straight. It’s very important, regardless of the damage—to schedule off-time When we arrived in Wauchula on Monday, the local utility people were already exhausted. You can work 15- and 16-hour days for a few days, but then you need time to sleep and eat.”

ROSALIE E. LEPOSKY is a writer in Miami, FL, who specializes in transportation, travel, and development issues.

DE - May/June 2005