Texas A&M Task Force 1 departs from College Station to assist Texas once storm Beryl hits

COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KBTX) – Tropical Storm Beryl is predicted to hit the coast of Texas in the next couple of days.

Under the direction of Governor Greg Abbott and the Texas Division of Emergency Management (TDEM), Texas A&M Task Force 1 deployed a team from College Station, and Texas Task Force 2 deployed from Dallas. Six additional water squads deployed from their home stations Saturday morning to assist Texas once the storm hits.

Texas A&M Task Force 1 (TX-TF1) will activate a Type 1 Urban Search and Rescue/Water Rescue. There are 68 personnel and eight Canines headed out with their luggage and gear to assist with possible wind damage and flooding.

The personnel arrived at the Texas A&M Task Force 1 headquarters around eight Saturday morning where they checked in, weighed themselves and their luggage, were medically examined to make sure they were in good health, and then they gathered and organized their special equipment and gear for the trip.

Texas A&M Task Force 1 then departed around 10:45 a.m.

The Director of Texas A&M Task Force 1, Jeff Saunders, said Texas A&M Task Force 1 will go to San Antonio Saturday and wait there until further guidance from the Texas Division of Emergency Management on where exactly in Texas they will go after the storm hits to offer help.

“Since Beryl is coming up from deep south Texas, we want to position them so that they have different ways they can go and San Antonio is probably the best spot for pre-positioning for a team like this,” said Saunders. “We will be pre-positioned until the tropical storm force winds have passed the area of impact, so we wait until the winds get below 40 miles per hour before we send the teams out unless there is a situation of life threat and we’ll take that risk into account.”

Saunders said their commitment to the state of Texas is to be prepared 48 hours in advance of any storm.

“This team is very seasoned, many of these members of this particular team have been out the door for 27 years, the bulk of our senior people are on our white team which is the team that is going out the door and they’ve been ready and they’re ready to go,” said Saunders.

KBTX spoke to the safety officer on this Texas A&M Task Force 1 deployment team, Steven Sparks, who is a firefighter at the Montgomery County Emergency Services District 8.

Sparks has been on the Texas A&M Task Force 1 since it started in 1997.

“I’ve been to wildfires, tornadoes, 9/11, an explosion in west Texas. Just about every disaster that has happened in the last 25 plus years, I’ve been to one of them, I’ve been to just about all of them,” said Sparks.

As they head to San Antonio Saturday from College Station, Sparks said he’s come to the aid of 20- 30 hurricane disasters over the years.

“I’ve been to just about every hurricane that has hit Texas or the U.S. Coast,” said Sparks.

Once in San Antonio, they’ll be ready to head where needed.

“We do door-to-door, house-to-house searches based on the amount of damage that has been done to the area,” said Sparks. “There can be floods and we go and we help with the evacuation and get people out of areas that they can’t get out of on their own.”

Sparks said with deployments like this, comes opportunities to possibly save lives.

Sparks gave KBTX an example of how he helped a woman in a previous hurricane rescue in Florida.

“She couldn’t get out, she had a special needs son, and she could make no phone calls. We got her food, we got her water, we got her call so she could get medicine for her son. Somehow she got at least 5 gallons of gas in her car so that she could leave once we cleared the driveway for her and that helped her situation,” said Sparks. “Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s hard, sometimes it’s just a lot of help to the right person.”

Sparks said their main goal is to help.

“Sometimes you get the big rescue, but usually it’s the little things that make a difference.”