Iowa soldiers to help flood-ravaged Missouri

DES MOINES - Gov. Terry Branstad announced Thursday that Iowa National Guard soldiers would be enlisted to provide assistance to flood-ravaged parts of Missouri.

National Guard officials, in cooperation with the governor and Iowa Homeland Security and Emergency Management, are deploying about 45 members and 20 vehicles from the Iowa Army National Guard to High Ridge, Mo., to provide water purification and water transportation services.

The Iowa soldiers are members of Companies A, B and C, 334th Brigade Support Battalion, 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 34th Infantry Division, located at Camp Dodge, Cedar Rapids and Oelwein. The soldiers and their equipment will arrive in Missouri on Friday and begin transporting and producing potable water that same day, according to the governor's office.

The Iowa National Guard is providing one Tactical Water Purification System (TWPS) and 15 'Hippos” (Load Handling System Compatible Water Tank Racks for transporting water) for the mission in Missouri. The TWPS uses state-of-the-art reverse osmosis technology to produce 1,500 gallons-per-hour of potable water. The Hippo consists of a 2,000-gallon potable water tank with an integrated pump, engine, alternator, filling stand, and 70-foot hose reel with bulk suction and discharge hoses. It has the capacity to pump 125 gallons of water per minute, Branstad's office announced.

The state of Missouri requested assistance from Iowa to help provide potable water after High Ridge's Public Water Supply District 2 Treatment Plant was contaminated by extensive flooding, according to the governor's office.

The Treatment Plant serves about 6,500 customers in High Ridge and Murphy, Mo. and is located about 350 miles southeast of Des Moines. More than 20,000 Missouri residents are currently without potable water due to flooding.

Support is provided under the Emergency Management Assistance Compact - an agreement executed previously between all 50 states, to assist one another in times of crisis, Branstad's office said in a news release.

EMAC is a national, mutual aid and partnership agreement that allows state-to-state assistance during governor-declared or federally declared emergencies. Once the conditions for providing assistance to a requesting state have been set, the terms constitute a legally binding contractual agreement that make affected states responsible for reimbursement, according to Branstad's office.