WASHINGTON — It’s been almost a month since Category 5 Hurricane Maria tore through Puerto Rico, leaving devastation in its wake.
With flights returning to the island territory, people in the D.C. area with connections to Puerto Rico are again catching flights to the storm-ravaged area.
At San Juan’s Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport, Jeannie, from southern Maryland, arrived to get her grandparents and in-laws, who all suffer from illnesses, to the mainland.
“They did not have access to their meds; they did not have access to their doctors,” Jeannie said.
She said her family lives in a mountain town near the El Yunque National Forest, an area which was left badly damaged by Hurricane Maria’s strong winds and rain.
“Conditions were pretty bad,” she said.
Jorge Socca just moved to D.C. three months ago; he’s back in Puerto Rico checking family and an office for his business, which he left behind.
“We’re happy that everything there is OK,” he said.
Much of the territory remains in the dark, and places with electricity, such as Socca’s office, are getting it from generators.
Magdalena Flores, of Manassas, Virginia, is in Puerto Rico to check on a home she owns in the town of Luquillo.
She said the devastation she witnessed heading to her home was shocking. “It was like a war zone, like somebody has dropped a bomb,” Flores said.
She added that one struggle for people who live there is getting simple necessities, such as food and water. Flores said most grocery stores had long lines, and people are only being allowed to buy enough food for one day at a time.
With the increased demand, the costs of supplies continue to go up, she said. “In the stores they have doubled up the prices of the things,” Flores said.
Flores said she saw the Federal Emergency Management Agency and members of the military at work throughout the island, but she believes more help is needed.
“We really need the military help — a lot of help,” Flores said.
WTOP’s Albert Shimabukuro contributed to this report.
