Officials in Kerr County, Texas — where 27 campers and counselors at a Christian summer camp were killed in catastrophic flooding — had discussed installing a flood warning system along the banks of the Guadalupe River, known as “Flash Flood Alley,” but it was rejected as too expensive. Kerr County, home to around 50,000 people, had looked into installing sirens, river gauges and other modern communication tools along the waterway in 2017, but ultimately decided against it, the New York Times reported. “We can do all the water-level monitoring we want, but if we don’t get that information to the public in a timely way, then this whole thing is not worth it,” Kerr County Commissioner Tom Moser said at the time. Search and recovery workers dig through debris looking for any survivors or remains of people swept up in the flash flooding at Camp Mystic on July 6, 2025, in Hunt, Texas. Getty Images A volunteer looks for missing people in the flood near Camp Mystic. AFP via Getty Images But the county, which has an annual budget of around $67 million, lost out on a bid to secure a $1 million grant to fund the project in 2017, county commission meeting minutes show. It is unclear how much installing a flood warning system would have cost specifically. Aerial illustration of Camp Mystic in Texas after flooding, showing distances from the Guadalupe River and locations of senior and junior cabins. Falon Wriede / NY Post Design Instead, local officials relied on a word-of-mouth system to pass messages about raging floodwaters downriver from the camps upstream. In a recent interview, Rob Kelly, the Kerr County judge and its most senior elected official, said residents were hesitant about the high cost of a warning system. Widespread damage is visible in and around Kerrville, Texas, on July 6, 2025, following a deadly flash flood. Reginald Mathalone/NurPhoto/Shutterstock “Taxpayers won’t pay for it,” he said, according to the Times. Meanwhile, county commissioners discussed using a flood warning system being developed by a regional agency as recently as May, budget meeting minutes show. A flood warning system was first suggested in 2015 in the wake of deadly floods in Wimberley, Texas, some 75 miles east of Kerrville, the Kerr County seat. Wimberley installed a more sophisticated monitoring system in the wake of the flooding, putting up cell towers to send out notices to all cellphones locally. People at the ruins of Camp Mystic. AP Former commissioner Moser visited Wimberley to view their new flood system and came back to Kerr County to push for a similar strategy. His proposal would have featured extra water detection systems and ways to alert the public, but budget concerns saw the scheme go nowhere. “It sort of evaporated. It just didn’t happen,” he told the Times. He admitted that he “didn’t know” if people might reconsider their position in light of the recent tragedy. Moser admitted it isn’t certain that a flood warning system like the one he proposed a decade ago would have prevented the recent tragedy in the county, which has seen at least 80 killed, including some 28 children — but he does believe it would have made a difference. “I think it could have helped a lot of people,” he said. The area is known as “Flash Flood County” because of its unique combination of weather patterns, soil and lack of green space.
Facts Racial hatred reared its head in Texas flash floods with a former Houston mayoral appointee lamenting that Camp Mystic tragedy was highlighted as it was "white-only" and "Christian". Hours after heavy rains and flash floods ripped though larget swathes of Texas Sade Perkins, a former Houston mayoral appointee, posted a video on her TikTok account, raging over the coverage about the tragedy. “I know I’m going to get cancelled for this, but Camp Mystic is a white-only girls’ Christian camp. They don’t even have a token Asian. They don’t have a token Black person. It’s an all-white, white-only conservative Christian camp. If you ain’t white you ain’t right, you ain’t gettin’ in, you ain’t goin’. Period,” Sade Perkins said in the video about the girls-only Camp Mystic. Read more at: https://economictimes.indiatimes.co...ofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst
Texas flood victims furious as local officials blame Trump's National Weather Service over failed warnings https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...rious-officials-national-weather-service.html Trump was Warned Cuts to NWS and NOAA Would Cost Lives. https://www.patheos.com/blogs/publi...arned-cuts-to-nws-and-noaa-would-kill-people/ Trump cut funding for weather forecasters – now dozens have died in Texas floods Doge slashed the national weather service despite warnings Americans would die – these deaths should be no surprise to the White House https://inews.co.uk/news/world/trum...zens-died-texas-floods-3790325?ito=smart-news
Noting that the FY 2025 FEMA Budget is from the Biden administration. The FY 2026 FEMA Budget is cut under Trump. The FEMA Budget has nothing to do with the funding for NWS and NOAA along with the DOGE cuts of staff of these agencies which now has obviously caused loss of life.
the fires in California were Newsom's fault so Abbot is to blame for the deaths from the flooding.... FACTS.
FEMA is part of DHS.... NWS is part of NOAA which is part of a completely different agency, department. Does your brain hurt? Cuts to the weather service by Trump and the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) have left NWS local forecast offices critically understaffed throughout this year’s heightened severe weather. In April, an internal document reportedly described how cuts could create a situation of “degraded” operations – shutting down core services one by one until it reaches an equilibrium that doesn’t overtax its remaining employees. yeah.. your brain must hurt from sitting idle too long...