Flash floods in Texas killed more than 80 people over the Fourth of July holiday weekend and left others still missing, including girls attending a summer camp. The devastation along the Guadalupe River, outside of San Antonio, has drawn a massive search effort as officials face questions over their preparedness and the speed of their initial actions.
Here’s what to know about the deadly flooding, the colossal weather system that drove it in and around Kerr County, Texas, and ongoing efforts to identify victims.
Massive rain hit at just the wrong time, in a flood-prone place
The floods grew to their worst at the midpoint of a long holiday weekend when many people were asleep.
The Texas Hill Country in the central part of the state is naturally prone to flash flooding due to the dry dirt-packed areas where the soil lets rain skid along the surface of the landscape instead of soaking it up. Friday’s flash floods started with a particularly bad storm that dropped most of its 12 inches of rain in the dark early morning hours.
After a flood watch notice midday Thursday, the National Weather Service office issued an urgent warning around 4 a.m. that raised the potential of catastrophic damage and a severe threat to human life. By at least 5:20 a.m., some in the Kerrville City area say water levels were getting alarmingly high. The massive rain flowing down hills sent rushing water into the Guadalupe River, causing it to rise 26 feet in just 45 minutes.
Death toll is expected to rise as campers remain missing
Gov. Greg Abbott said Sunday that there were 41 people confirmed to be unaccounted for across the state and more could be missing.
In Kerr County, home to youth camps in the Texas Hill Country, searchers have found the bodies of 68 people, including 28 children, Sheriff Larry Leitha said Sunday afternoon. Fatalities in nearby counties brought the total number of deaths to 82 as of Monday morning.
Ten girls and a counselor were still unaccounted for at Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the river.
Three girls from Dallas — 8-year-olds Hadley Hanna and Eloise Peck and 9-year-old Lila Bonner — were identified as missing Camp Mystic campers. Bonner’s family confirmed to CBS Texas on Saturday that she was among the children confirmed dead and Peck’s family on Sunday posted a note at their home saying she had died as well.
Two sisters from Dallas — 13-year-old Blair Harber and 11-year-old Brooke Harber — were also confirmed dead by the St. Rita Catholic Community church in Dallas.
Photo by Danielle Villasana for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Camp Mystic’s owner and director Dick Eastland died while trying to save girls at the camp, according to local media reports. The obituary section of the Kerrville community news site was dotted with tributes to victims, including Eastland.
For past campers, the tragedy turned happy memories into grief.
Beyond the Camp Mystic campers unaccounted for, the number of missing from other nearby campgrounds and across the region had not been released.
“We don’t even want to begin to estimate at this time,” Kerrville City Manager Dalton Rice said Saturday, citing the likely influx of visitors during the July Fourth holiday.
Officials face scrutiny over flash flood warnings
Survivors have described the floods as a “pitch black wall of death” and said they received no emergency warnings.
Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly, who lives along the Guadalupe River, said Saturday that “nobody saw this coming.” Various officials have referred to it as a “100-year-flood,” meaning that the water levels were highly unlikely based on the historical record.
And records behind those statistics don’t always account for human-caused climate change. Though it’s hard to connect specific storms to a warming planet so soon after they occur, meteorologists say that a warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture and allow severe storms to dump even more rain.
Additionally, officials have come under scrutiny about why residents and youth summer camps along the river were not alerted sooner than 4 a.m. or told to evacuate.
Officials noted that the public can grow weary from too many flooding alerts or forecasts that turn out to be minor.
Kelly said authorities were shocked by the ferocity of the floods. “We had no reason to believe that this was gonna be any, anything like what’s happened here. None whatsoever,” Kelly told “CBS Evening News.”
Kerr county officials said they had presented a proposal for a more robust flood warning system, similar to a tornado warning system, but that members of the public reeled at the cost.
On Sunday, officials walked out of a news briefing after reporters asked them again about delays in alerts and evacuations.
Search for victims and monumental cleanup
With more rain on the way, the risk of life-threatening flooding was still high in central Texas on Monday even as crews search urgently for the missing. Volunteers, search dogs and drones have joined the effort — with some rescuers maneuvering through challenging terrain filled with snakes.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a social media post that the U.S. Coast Guard was responsible for saving more than 200 people, as dramatic video showed Guard members conducting aerial rescues near Kerrville, while dark water covered the ground.
The flash floods have erased campgrounds and torn homes from their foundations.
“It’s going to be a long time before we’re ever able to clean it up, much less rebuild it,” Kelly said Saturday after surveying the destruction from a helicopter.
Other massive flooding events have driven residents and business owners to give up, including in areas struck last year by Hurricane Helene.
President Donald Trump signed a major disaster declaration Sunday for Kerr County and said he would likely visit Friday: “I would have done it today, but we’d just be in their way.”
“It’s a horrible thing that took place, absolutely horrible,” he told reporters.
At the Vatican, Pope Leo extended a prayer to the flooding victims during Sunday mass, saying, “I express my sincere condolences to all the families who have lost loved ones, in particular their daughters who were at summer camp, in the disaster caused by the flooding of the Guadalupe river in Texas in the United States.”
