Search crews combed central Texas for a fourth straight day on Monday, scouring the swollen Guadalupe River for dozens of people still missing after flash floods that killed at least 80, most of them in Kerrville.
Teams slogged along brown, debris-strewn banks and searched from the air with eight state helicopters and a US Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drone fitted with infrared sensors.
The operation, involving more than 700 emergency personnel, continued around the clock while 41 residents remained unaccounted for, state officials said.
Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha put the county’s confirmed death toll at 68, including 28 children. Most perished when a wall of water, unleashed by predawn storms that dropped up to 15 inches [38 cm] in less than an hour, roared through the Hill Country town of 25,000 people northwest of San Antonio.
The Guadalupe, fed by two branches that merge just upstream, leapt its banks so quickly that families had little time to flee. “It was twice the rain anyone forecast,” Kerrville City Manager Dalton Rice told reporters.
Camp Mystic
Among the hardest-hit sites was Camp Mystic, a 98-year-old Christian girls’ retreat perched on a bend in the river. Leitha said crews were still searching for 10 campers and one counselor, four days after officials first reported two dozen youngsters missing. He did not clarify the fate of the others.
Across neighboring Burnet, Tom Green, Travis and Williamson counties, another 10 flood-related deaths were confirmed. More than 850 people had been rescued since Friday, many plucked from rooftops or hauled from treetops by helicopter winch.
‘Hot, muddy, snakes’
Freeman Martin, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, cautioned that the toll would grow as waters receded. “It’s hot, there’s mud, they’re moving debris, there’s snakes,” he said of teams navigating the wreckage in 95-degree Fahrenheit [35-degree Celsius] heat.
Officials warned that even modest showers could ignite fresh flash flooding on the saturated terrain as the Independence Day neared. State emergency managers had flagged the risk last Thursday, but the deluge far outstripped National Weather Service forecasts.
Governor Greg Abbott said the adequacy of those forecasts and the county’s warning systems would be reviewed once the immediate crisis passed.
Federal aid
The Federal Emergency Management Agency was activated on Sunday after President Donald Trump approved a major disaster declaration, freeing up funds and equipment. US Coast Guard helicopters from Corpus Christi and fixed-wing aircraft joined the search.
Trump told reporters he expected to visit the disaster zone on Friday. The Republican has frequently argued that states should bear a greater share of natural-disaster costs, and his administration has trimmed thousands of jobs from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, parent agency of the Weather Service.
Former NOAA administrator Rick Spinrad and other experts said the cuts left many local offices short-staffed. The San Antonio forecast center, responsible for Kerr County, has had no warning coordination meteorologist since April, when the long-time incumbent took early retirement.
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Source: CNN, Reuters, NBC, Associated Press