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Texas floods: Were warnings issued in time? What we know about alerts and evacuation orders
Texas floods death toll has surpassed 100. As search efforts continue, questions are mounting over whether the tragedy could have been prevented.
The death toll from catastrophic flooding in Texas over the July Fourth weekend has risen to more than 100, with 27 of the victims being young girls who were staying at Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the Guadalupe River. Most of the fatalities occurred in Kerr County, while other deaths were reported in Travis, Burnet, Williamson, Kendall, and Tom Green counties.
As search-and-rescue teams continue wading through swollen rivers in a desperate search for the missing, questions are mounting about whether more could have been done to prevent the tragedy.
What happened?
On the night of Friday, July 4, as much as 10 inches (25 cm) of heavy rain fell in just a few hours in central Kerr County. Around 4 a.m. local time, the Guadalupe River overflowed its banks, sending fast-rising floodwaters through the area. At that moment, 27 girls staying at Camp Mystic were caught in the flooding and went missing.
Were flood warnings given in time?
According to AccuWeather, both it and the National Weather Service (NWS) issued flash flood warnings several hours before the flooding began. The alerts urged residents to move to higher ground and evacuate flood-prone areas immediately.
The NWS also issued a flash flood emergency at 4:23 a.m. local time, just as the Guadalupe River was overflowing.
AccuWeather said in a statement, "These warnings should have provided officials with ample time to evacuate camps such as Camp Mystic and get people to safety.”
Did Kerr County issue evacuation orders?
According to CNN, at least one neighboring county issued evacuation orders on the morning of July 4. However, Kerr County officials did not.
A review of the NWS messaging system showed that Kerr County had no visible interaction with the platform, unlike emergency officials from surrounding counties, who were actively coordinating with the National Weather Service.
Also Read: Texas floods: How you can help victims and support affected families
Was there a failure to warn?
Experts say the warnings themselves were timely and accurate, but they may not have reached those who needed them most.
“The forecasting was good. The warnings were good. It’s always about getting people to receive the message,” Chris Vagasky, a meteorologist based in Wisconsin, told NBC News “It appears that is one of the biggest contributors — that last mile.”
Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, added, "You have areas where there is no cell phone coverage, plus some coverage. t doesn't matter how many alert systems you sign up for, you're not going to get that."
A better early warning system could have helped
In 2017, Kerr County officials considered installing a flood warning system but ultimately lost a bid for a $1 million federal grant to fund the project. The system would have included river gauges, sirens, and modern communication tools along the Guadalupe River, part of what is known as “Flash Flood Alley."
Nick Bassill, director of the New York State Weather Risk Communication Center, told the New York Post, "No one is ever going to complain about having more data when it comes to hazardous weather. Then there’s the question of, once you know that the flooding is imminent, how do you communicate that to the people who maybe aren’t able to be communicated too, like if they’re at a camp somewhere or something like that.”
He said even a basic NOAA weather radio could have made a major difference.
“A really basic one that is probably close to a must-have in these sort of situations would be a NOAA weather radio, so if you’re in an area without Internet or cell phone service and there’s a flash flood warning in the middle of the night, you’ve got your radio on, you’ll be woken up by a sort of jarring alert from it. So that would be … a really obvious kind of low-cost solution,” he told the outlet.
