Paramedic Tom Lawrence, of West Greenwich, says the Rhode Island Disaster Medical Assistance Team is going to Texas.

The Providence Journal / Steve Szydlowski

As tropical storm Gustav lashed at the edges of Jamaica yesterday and a hurricane watch was issued in Cuba, the Rhode Island Disaster Medical Assistance Team gathered at its headquarters in West Greenwich, awaiting its final orders to help people in the Gulf Coast.

Yesterday marked three years to the day that the state’s team of medical professionals and public safety workers was called to assist when Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast.

Tom Lawrence, a pediatric paramedic at Hasbro Children’s Hospital and deputy commander of the D-MAT in Rhode Island, said the team had been notified that they were being sent to Texas to assist with medical needs in anticipation of Gustav becoming a hurricane.

The team can set up temporary emergency rooms in places where no hospitals exist, or in the parking lots of hospitals overwhelmed with the injured. The team can distribute medications, assist in evacuating hospitals and nursing homes, and, as they did after Hurricane Katrina and 9/11, treat the wounded after a disaster.

There are 250 members on the team, including doctors, nurses, firefighters, paramedics and other medical professionals. Thirty-five are deploying for this mission.