PANAMA CITY – The Bay County Sheriff’s Office has begun deploying resources to Pinellas County in preparation for Hurricane Milton’s expected landfall in Tampa.
A search and rescue team of five left before dawn Tuesday morning for an emergency operations center in Pinellas County. They brought three shallow-water boats and two high-water vehicles to assist with the rescue effort once the storm passed.
The BCSO says it plans to send a 20-person deployment team to neighboring Hillsborough County, where Tampa is located, on Thursday. This crew will provide any requested or needed services in the area, including securing distribution points, clearing roads, covering homes, and relieving local law enforcement so they can begin to recover in the aftermath.
“This is an opportunity to repay the generous assistance Bay County received six years ago from so many sheriffs across the state following Hurricane Michael,” said Bay County Sheriff Tommy Ford. “The look on the faces of those in need when help arrives, I remember that feeling. It’s fulfilling and even a privilege to be able to bring that hope to others.”
A forward operating team of four BCSO personnel will also depart for Hillsborough County Thursday morning, where they will help coordinate and manage law enforcement resources throughout the area.
Ford chairs the Florida Sheriff’s Association Task Force, which manages disaster response among sheriff’s offices. He leaves for Tallahassee on Wednesday morning.
Ruth Corley, BCSO public affairs specialist, emphasized the importance of being self-reliant and not taxing the already scarce resources in the affected areas. She said responding personnel have a tent, cots and their own food truck so they can have a minimal footprint while providing services to the community. When asked about the safety of personnel present at the landfall, Corley added that the team that departed today will stay in an emergency operations center, which is built to withstand Category 5 storm conditions.
The BCSO does not intervene itself after a disaster. Requests for assistance are submitted by agencies in the affected areas to the state-level task force, which then coordinates where available law enforcement resources can be deployed. Although BCSO was not explicitly chosen to respond because of its disaster management experience, the agency has made quite a few gains since Hurricane Michael made landfall six years ago this week.
The BCSO recently returned from assisting Suwannee County after Hurricane Helene made landfall nearly two weeks ago.
This article originally appeared in The News Herald: BCSO crews headed to Pinellas, Hillsborough counties, ahead of Milton
