Governor Andrew Cuomo traveled with a team of emergency response officials to help restore power to areas of Puerto Rico still in the dark. NY1's Michael Herzenberg reports.
A tearful Congresswoman Nydia Valasquez sounded like thousands of other New Yorkers as she geared up with Governor Andrew Cuomo and dozens of others for a humanitarian mission to the island.
"To me, this is personal," Velazquez said. "I have not been able to talk to my family yet."
"The Puerto Rican community is such a large part of New York," Cuomo said. "You literally grow up together. You knew each other as family."
Puerto Rico's governor reached out to New York's governor for help.
The JetBlue-donated flight carries more than 34,000 bottles of water, 9,600 meals ready to eat, thousands of canned goods, cots, pillows, blankets and 10 industrial strength generators to power hospitals and community centers.
The day trip also brings 27 members of the Army Air National Guard Joint Taskforce Empire Shield.
Colonel Isabelle Smith says this trip is about information gathering.
"We can help them out in many ways with transporation assets, security assets. We just need to find out what their needs are," Smith said.
The governor also tapped the New York Power Authority for translators and engineers for one of Puerto Rico's most pressing needs.
Hurricane Maria knocked out power to the entire island.
The Department of Environmental Conservation is deploying two drone pilots to fly over power transmissions and distribution looking for problems.
The governor thanked service members for their work. But for some, like Velazquez, brewing on this first flight back into Puerto Rico after the storm is emotional.
"They're trying to go to my hometown of Jaboqoa, where the hurricane made landfall yesterday," she said.
Sixty members of the New York Army National Guard, four Black Hawk helicopters and 50 state police remain on standby and may be dispatched to help in the coming days.