Army Corps eyes Seattle Seahawks stadium for hospital beds as coronavirus cases rise
The Army Corps of Engineers is planning to be on the ground in Washington state as early as next week to assess facilities, including the Seattle Seahawks stadium, that can be turned into hospital areas to help with the coronavirus pandemic, the head of the service said on Friday.
The Corps is in preliminary discussions on using CenturyLink field to create hospital space, Army Lt. Gen. Todd Semonite, commanding general and chief engineer of the Army Corps of Engineers, said
The hospital area would not be on the open field, but in one of the adjoining facilities, he said. Other event spaces in Seattle are also under consideration.
“It’s a significant investment we’re going to make in that area,” Semonite said. “If it was going to be in the stadium, it wouldn’t be on the field it would be in supporting facilities.”
Semonite said he plans to travel to Chicago and then Seattle next week to look at the sites.
The Corps also plans to create a 360-bed field hospital to treat both coronavirus and regular trauma care patients in Sacramento’s Sleep Train Arena, as it shifts away from initially planning to use hotel rooms.
The Seattle and Sacramento event centers are just two of 114 locations in all 50 states where governors are now asking the Corps to help them set up hospital beds as the number of coronavirus cases continues to rise across the country, Semonite said.
“I would think that the 114 is going to keep going up by 20 to 30 every single day,” he told reporters at the Pentagon.
Over the last week, the Corps has shifted from its initial plan to convert hotel rooms into hospital rooms, to using large convention and sports centers to avoid delays from signing a lease with each hotel while demand for hospital beds rapidly increases.
Each one of those 114 locations may need 5,000 to 10,000 beds, Semonite said.
The Corps also did not previously think it could create sites that were isolated within large event centers, he said.
“The one in California, the Sacramento one, what my guys are telling me is that it’s going to be COVID in one portion and Non-COVID in the other,” Semonite said.
“I did not think we could meet the COVID standard in a massive big building,” he said. “But my engineers are telling me we think we’ve got the capability to do that.”
The Corps is also in active discussions with the state of Florida because of the rapid growth in the number of cases there.
“When we look at Florida, you have a more aging community there, I know the state continues to look at challenges in Miami, Orlando and Tampa,” Semonite said. “Right now we are still developing options and it’s probably premature - but we’re very aware because of the little bit more senior community, that that could be an unbelievable high demand.”
This story was originally published March 27, 2020 at 3:58 PM.
