SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has completed collection of debris in Hormigueros, Puerto Rico – the first municipality on the island to complete the mission with USACE.
“To be the first municipality to achieve this milestone is significant. It shows the resolve of the mayor and the Hormigueros community to get back on their feet,” said Col. Andrew Yoder, Recovery Field Office commander. “The coordination between USACE and the Hormigueros municipality has been a smooth one."
Hormigueros is the first municipality to have reached this final stage in completing the debris removal mission in Puerto Rico after hurricanes Irma and Maria.
“This community demonstrates the resilience throughout the island. We are excited to have achieved this milestone with such strong people,” said Kayla Stull, debris mission manager. “We look forward to achieving continued success like this with the rest of the communities throughout Puerto Rico. We’re about halfway, so there’s still plenty of work to do.”
The large-scale debris removal effort, spanning every corner of the island, involves locally-contracted drivers actively collecting debris from 52 (now 51) of 78 municipalities and delivering the vegetative material to temporary reduction sites to be ground into mulch, and hauling construction and demolition debris after sorting out the recyclable material in an effort to reduce the amount of debris sent to the landfills.
USACE is halfway through its debris mission on Puerto Rico by removing nearly 2 million cubic yards of 3.9 million cubic yards of material. The total debris estimated for removal by USACE and the local communities in Puerto Rico is 6.2 million cubic yards.
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Release no. 18-003