From the Cliff Mass Weather Blog
On Friday morning, heavy rains led to catastrophic flooding along the Guadalupe River in central Texas.
Tragically, it appears that at least fifty people lost their lives.
But what is particularly disturbing is that the National Weather Service (NWS) provided excellent warnings and forecasts before the event that clearly predicted a substantial threat.
And yet, no attempt at evacuation was made.
Furthermore, weather model forecasts indicated the potential for a major precipitation event over this historically flood-prone region during the prior days.
The Event
The flooding occurred around 4 AM on July 4.
A heavy precipitation event was forecast for the region during the previous days. For example, the NOAA/NWS HRRR forecast from 8 PM July 3 (the evening before) predicted a band of heavy rain over central Texas.
THE DAY BEFORE, the NWS Forecast Office in San Antonia put out a flood watch for central Texas Hill Country, which included the site of the tragedy.
During the subsequent hours, the National Weather Service communicated increasingly strong warnings, including flash flood warnings. A children’s camp on a floodplain should have been evacuated.
Here is the warning by the local NWS office several hours before the flood.
Also consider the warning by the National Weather Service Weather Prediction Center (WPC) before the event:
As the event got closer, with National Weather Service radar showing the event unfolding, the San Antonia office made the threat explicit, noting a very dangerous flash event.
Any media or other organization suggesting that the National Weather Service was not on top of this event is not only not telling the truth, but doing a deep disservice to the highly professional and skillful folks in that organization.
Some folks are making such suggestions for patently political reasons. Extraordinarily unethical and wrong.
Areas along the Guadalupe River have flooded catastrophically many times in the past, and not evacuating low-lying areas with such warnings verges on criminal neglect. The local county (Kerr) does not even have a flood warning system in place.
The Texas flooding is another example of large numbers of deaths, even when weather forecasts are excellent, with all too many other examples, including the Maui wildfires, the LA wildfires, and flooding from Hurricane Helene.
But if you really want to experience media and advocacy group loss of moral compass, consider those claiming this event is the result of global warming.
For example, this connection was suggested by the New York Times:
There is NO EVIDENCE that the central Texas floods are the result of climate change.
For example, the Environmental Protection Agency has noted that flooding is DECLINING over time in that region (see below)
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I examined this issue myself. Below is a plot of the extreme daily precipitation in July for nearby San Antonio from the 1940s to today.
There is NO upward trend, which suggests that climate change is not a factor in this event.
If climate change was significant, there WOULD be an upward trend.
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In summary, society needs to learn how to effectively use the greatly improved prediction and observational capabilities that now exist.
Most weather-related deaths can be prevented if society makes use of this valuable information.
Those using disasters to support their political and social change agendas are not only hurting those they wish to help, but acting in a morally and ethically indefensible way.
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Coverage map for the Kerrville NWS VHF (weather radio) transmitter:
https://www.weather.gov/nwr/sites?site=WWF90
NWS (weather radio) coverage for all of Texas: https://www.weather.gov/nwr/county_coverage?State=TX
As the risk of getting everyone mad at me –
A – Everyone agrees this was an extremely unfortunate event – prayers for the families
B – The NWS did provide warnings and the camps should have had staff that monitored the weather in order to provide warnings
C – The being said, I live in the North Texas area and the weather forecast 2-3 days out from july 1s, & 2nd, showed no potential rainfall for the next several days. Yet Dallas got very heavy rains on the evening of both 7/4 and 7/5, even though the weather forecast only 7-8 hours before the rain storm show very little chance of rain. The rain forecast didnt show up until approx 4 hours before the rain – Weather dot com. ( I pay attention to weather forecasts much more than the average person since I am a cyclists that rides 200+ miles per week). Again, its likely that very few of the adults at the camp were paying attention to the weather.
Note that I am not praising or condemning anyone, just noting some likely thought processes.
In one camp, someone was paying attention and got the kids to higher ground prior to the disaster. It is unfortunate that the other adults were not so aware of what was going on.
No one is getting mad at you for pointing these things out.
As I noted, I pay attention to weather forecasting a lot more than most individuals because of my sport. My guess is that most people that look at the weather forecast for 2-4 days out and see no chance of rain are not going be paying attention to the weather, Its unfortunate, but if the perceived threat is low, then people are not going to pay attention. In this case, the weather forecast changed dramatically for the worse with about 4 hours warning.
You did. And that is good.
It is also unfortunate that one or more of the camps banned camper electronics of all types.
Middle of the night, no local warning system, no access to remote warning systems, and camping on the banks of the river all added up to a recipe for disaster.
The real crime is the lack of humanity expressed by those viciously pointing fingers and making extremist accusations.
First, deal with the tragedy, the human beings affected.
Then do the post mortem. Figure out what needs fixed or improved.
Then just do it.
joe-Dallas,
Perhaps we can help you.
What are you looking for, that causes you to cycle 200 miles a week? What is your target? Is there a hidden treasure of some value, or maybe you have poor maps so you get lost.
For 3 years in my teens, my compulsory target was school. It was by bicycle, 5 miles there, 5 miles back. Bikes in those days had only one, fixed gear so hills were a push. I changed to a car on my birthday when I turned old enough to get a driver licence and never rode a bike again.
Geoff S
Geoff – LOL – fwiw worth – it happens to be fun – still competing in crit races. Did I mention its still fun, with the exception of the 30/30’s I do once a week in my training schedule. Those are painful.
Similar for 5th through 9th grade. Bicycle, rain, snow, dark of night, uphill both ways. (-:
High school was within walking distance. Half a mile or so.
Loved the bicycle. Just can’t do 50 mile commutes at my age.
Last week we went out on the boat despite warnings of 20-25 knot winds. As most often, the wind never went over 15. “Strong Wind” warnings are so common that you would never go out if you took them seriously. This is the “safety” culture, and it means that the weather service can never be blamed. The one time we got caught in 50 knots, we were already on our way to shelter, having observed the storm coming.
I have read that flash flood warnings in Texas are the same – many many warnings that make people ignore them.
That was my first thought, “safety culture”. Unless government owns us and can order everyone around when we don’t know whether there’s an emergency, then some will choose to do (what turns out to be) the wrong thing and people will die.
Are we free, even when it puts us after risk?
Schumer wants to blame Trump and DOGE.
NYT wants to blame climate change.
Reality is Kerr County did not install flash flood warnings sirens in the Guadalupe flood plain (like the midwest has almost literally everywhere for tornado warnings) despite known as being very flash flood prone. Yet the adjacent county did have them, resulting in almost no deaths. Warning sirens in the dead of night even half an hour before the event would have enabled evacuations.
This lack of Kerr preparedness has resulted as of now in 82 known dead with over at least 40 still missing.
‘Warning sirens in the dead of night even half an hour before the event would have enabled evacuations.’
Perhaps less of a tragedy. I don’t pretend to know the country – is there any real high ground in the vicinity that’s accessible by car, or even by foot at dark am?
At least tornadoes can be observed on modern doppler weather radars and warnings sent up, including area wide sirens (but those will be only in developed areas not out in the boondocks). You cannot “see” a flash flood on a radar screen, only a thunderstorm which may or may not produce a flash flood – it all depends upon where the storm cells drop their rains, how hard, and what the terrain is like in a particular highly localized spot.
Not sure what kind of flash flood warnings go out anywhere … because the key word is “flash” meaning sudden. I lived for many years in the mountainous Rocky Mountain and Southwest states where it’s common knowledge that any significant rainstorm in country with terrain can produce a deadly flash flood in the summertime, sometimes in just a few minutes time from the start of the storm. Yet people get killed all the time in those flash floods. Is it because they don’t understand the dangers of flash floods? Or is it because they don’t get sufficient warning?
That river system is extraordinarily prone to flash floods. The surface is about as impervious a surface as anything in nature. I am pretty sure that the forecasts showed disasterous potential rainfall a few hours ahead of it actually occurring. The problem is how to get the word out in that rural area with sparse cell coverage.
Potential for flash floods + sparse cell coverage = be cautious, be very, very cautious.
‘The surface is about as impervious a surface as anything in nature.’
Excellent point, Roger.
Topology is well known, weather radar indicates strength of rain and where it is occurring. Combine the two and you can get a flash flood prediction that is pretty good.
Flash does not mean instantaneous, even flash floods can be predicted half and hour to an hour in advance.
And if one isn’t glued to their iphone or TV set 24/7/365, how does that “half hour to an hour advance warning” work?
You are claiming that flash flood warnings “are pretty good”. That’s nonsense. Flash floods are the product of numerous highly localized and extremely variable phenomena and conditions that simply cannot be modeled (all predictions come from models) across all areas at a sufficiently granular level, and then disseminated to precisely the correct recipients at precisely the right time with sufficient response time to make any difference in the outcome – a flash flood with dead people, or not. The area, duration, and intensity of any individual or group of thunderstorm cells … the specific terrain of an area receiving direct rainfall plus upstream contributions … the geometry of a specific stream channel … the antecedent soil moisture … the character of ground surfaces (rocky, various soil types, etc … the character of local surface vegetation … the character of land development … etc etc etc.
All that any modeler – ie forecaster – can do is generate regional generalized warnings that “there is a risk of flooding”. Which is exactly what NWS did. After that it is all on emergency services and local media to communicate to the general population to be aware of a heightened risk of flooding. And even if one receives the warning will they act accordingly in a timely manner? Many people refuse to do so.
There is a reason these are called “flash” floods. They arise extremely suddenly, absent days of advance warnings. And then it comes down to being in the wrong place at the wrong time … or not.
.I do not know why anyone would find your informative comment offensive and give you down arrows. Perhaps the climate alarmists with their constantly crying wolf makes the public less likely to listen to real warnings.
He wasn’t singing with the choir.
Two cellphone auto-blasted warning messages went out hours before the wall hit. That’s pretty good. The camp paid a huge price for being a no-devices zone so that they didn’t get the message until too late (the director was found dead in a car with three juveniles after they tried, unsuccessfully, to escape after they realized what was going on).
My down-vote was for the first sentence that appeared to be a statement saying that flash floods couldn’t be predicted and were the will of a capricious god. Further explanation below tempered that, but the post appeared, to me, to contradict itself with that later explanation. And the statement that “…and conditions that they cannot be modeled” is flat out wrong because they can be simulated as “if 30 inches falls over these 30 acres 6 hours then what happens?” That would be a mathematical model. Apply stochastic conditioning to it similar to what is used for modeling geologic Resources (simulate hundreds or thousands of times and estimate percentage likelihoods) and a range of prospective outcomes for an incoming storm system should be able to be estimated (which would be a more advanced model).
Eyewitness accounts describe the worst event as a Flash Flood, or as a Wall of Water, which normally means that the cause (an intense cloudburst) occurred somewhere many miles upstream — think of a dam-break suddenly unleashing torrents. Usually, in such cases, it’s not a case of there being no ‘high ground’ within walking distance (as in the slot canyons of So. Utah), rather it’s being caught totally unawares, at night when one can’t associate the sound with the sight of the impending wave-front.
Regarding the local terrain, I’d be skeptical of anyone claiming that this particular location was especially vulnerable among Hill Country sites. I’ve hiked in Lost Maples State Park (Sabinal River) not too far away (and actually mentioned by name in the alert cited that morning) which could hardly be any better.
Farther West, people are always surprised to learn that there are more deaths in the Desert, year-in & year-out, from drowning than from the heat. As kids in the 1960s-’70s, in camping & scouting, this was drilled into our heads: never make camp in a (dry) waterway (‘wash’ or ‘draw’), as a nocturnal thunderstorm upstream (this was the Superstition Mountain Wilderness, or Mogollon Rim country) even 20 miles away could drown you before you even knew what was happening.
Even so, it happens. Many boys died at a scout camp along the Tonto or Christopher Creeks, about a decade ago. All over the news. Families heartbroken. Recriminations. No doubt it was a 100-yr event or something like that. Only when it affects thousands of victims / rescues, like this one, does it get this much attention.
P.S. Even now (80+ hrs later), in San Antonio and its environs, we remain under a Flood Watch, thunderstorms expected to resume soon.
Someone reminded me:
State of Fear (2004) by Michael Crichton* includes a fictional account of a Flash Flood — triggered in the Oak Creek Canyon of Arizona (above the town of Sedona) — by ‘Eco-Terrorists’, replete with last-second weather warnings & a hair-raising evacuation of camp / picnic grounds.
*He of the famous ‘Consensus Science is Not Science’ lecture at Caltech, around that time. ‘Climate of Fear’ would’ve been a good title. It attracted all the right enemies.
A flash flood does not require a cloudburst many miles upstream. It can result from an intense rainfall in just the immediate area of the contributing watershed. And it is highly localized in many cases. But many factors can affect the risk of a flash flood.
Any area with hilly or mountainous terrain with surface conditions prone to maximizing runoff vs infiltration can be susceptible to flash flooding. The TX hill country is, as the name says, “hilly” … meaning that stream flows from runoff tend to be concentrated in relatively narrow channels, rather than spreading out over broad areas. This creates potentially deep and swift channel flows. If there has already been a lot of rainfall in the preceding days and hours, saturated soils will flood more rapidly. If surface soils are clay vs sand or silt, they will also flood more rapidly.
Local development also matters … channelization and levies may reduce the spreading out of floodwaters upstream, but that can also increase the flood risk of downstream reaches of the river floodplain.
re A flash flood does not require a cloudburst many miles upstream.
That’s right. But if the intense rainfall is nearby, one is more likely to be aware of it and move out of the floodwater channel.
Because of the unpredictable path of tornadoes, most towns get 5 minutes (siren) warning. Some a bit more.
If your electronics are off, it does not matter what doppler shows.
Both systems are needed. The 2 hour advanced warning would have saved lives.
Not just Kerr, a corridor of counties in mid Texas going towards the Gulf are prone to extreme flash flooding. Has been proposed to install water monitor network through the region. Proposed is as far as it ever gets. Fairly certain there is a water monitor system in immediate Austin area.
This should be scrollable.
It’s the current water gauges that report to USGS and/or NWS.
https://water.noaa.gov/wfo/iln#@=-98.581117,30.9709742,6.495925&b=topographic&g=obsFcst,1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!1!0!0!0!0!0,0.5,1!1!1!1!0,0,0,true&ab=0,0,#D94B4A,1,1,1,#cccccc,1,0,0,#B243B1,1,0,0,#98E09A,1,false&a=hydrologic,0.35,false&s=0,0,0.9,0.9,false&n=false,#72afe9,0.9,0,0.9,0,0.9,false&p=false,0.75,0,7,0,1,2025,7,9,0,false&d=0,0,1,1,1,1,1,1,#006EFF,1,#006EFF,1,#006EFF,1,#006EFF,1,#006EFF,false&q=wfo%3AILN
Thanks for link! None upstream of Mystic, not one on that branch at all. Looking at google earth things become a bit clearer. There are two catch dams upstream from them and one just past them. Going farther there are two more, with big catch basins. Holy crap.
https://earth.google.com/web/search/Camp+Mystic+Way+South,+Hunt,+TX/@30.00608123,-99.38036469,586.28699304a,3906.89624987d,35y,0h,0t,0r/data=CiwiJgokCfc5z61RHz5AEYtxWSAJCj5AGSJvNKEm01jAITJcEpOS4FjAQgIIAToDCgEwQgIIAEoNCP___________wEQAA?authuser=0
Cypress Creek has several also.
I suppose flood warning sirens, which I’ve never heard of, could have alerted people to imminent danger. That requires water gauges on every river, gully, or canyon, even if there is no river or creek. It also requires accurate prediction of which watersheds and their sirens will be affected by heavy rainfall upstream. That’s a lot more complicated than a tornado warning system. It’s not impossible, but a lot of expensive infrastructure has to be built, much of it in remote areas.
There were weather alerts well ahead of time along with flash flood warnings. The problem is that people often don’t factor severe weather into their plans. To see the warnings, you have to subscribe to alerts, listen to the radio, or see them on TV or the internet. It happened in the middle of the night when no one would have seen the alerts, though the warnings were issued hours and days before. Sirens might have awoken people, but most of the people who were killed were in remote areas. Tornado sirens are usually placed in populated areas. Where do you put all the proposed flood warning sirens so people can hear them?
Start with commonly used camp grounds and work outward from there.
They do not need to be tied to flood or water gauges. They can be triggered by civil defense personnel or the local sheriff.
I live just northwest of Austin, and there were multiple flash flood warnings on my phone that day. One issue with the girl’s summer camp was that all electronics were forbidden, proving that one can not do only one thing. BTW, the owner of the camp is reported to have died in the flash flood.
The only way I see to deal with flash floods would be a lot of small dams on that watershed, which would cause The Green Blob to suffer sphincter accidents.
This is normal weather for the Hill Country, AKA the Balcones Escarpment. Marble Falls
had similar storms in 2007 and 2018.
In the Midwest, tornado warning sirens mean nobody is relying on portable electronics. The closest little town (population maybe 500, with one gas station) to my dairy farm has one so loud we can hear it from 3 miles away up over the ridge.
Kerr County rejected a flood warning system a few years ago.
There’s this.
https://www.kvue.com/article/news/history/guadalupe-river-flash-flood-teens-killed-1987-comfort-texas/269-e92dd375-b461-4ce7-8723-188a9de6a03a
“…all electronics were forbidden…”
Saw that question raised in a “Climate Change Dispatch” comment earlier today. No cell phone, no alert.
Not even a weather radio?
Such a tragic event. Those in the media trying to push an agenda on the back of it should be ashamed.
+10
Oh wow, commiserations to all those who have suffered.
But here in Surrey, UK we’ve had mostly dry, warmer weather than average for months. And they’re telling us it’s “climate change.” And implicitly, that it’s our fault.
So, what do they say when the situation is reversed, as in February and early March 2018, when we here suffered the “Beast from the East” snow-storm. And in Texas? “During the month of February, the southern Trans Pecos region, the Lower Valley, and Southeast Texas all saw temperatures more than four degrees above normal. The remainder of West and South Texas observed temperatures between two and four degrees above normal.”
Weather changes. But climate? Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
The anti-Trumpers are already blaming the DOGE cuts to NOAA for a supposed failure of the NWS to forecast this tragic event. The fact is that the only increase in NOAA related funding in the 2026 budget is to the NWS – $1.3B or 37% of NOAA’s overall budget. The cuts in budget and personnel were primarily to the climate catastrophe political propaganda scare merchants. This would seem to indicate the Trump administration’s prioritizing reliable weather forecasting over the fantasy doom and gloom climate change scam.
Sorry — the cuts to NOAA were NOT targeting the climate catastrophe propaganda people — the employee cuts affected all areas of operations and research in many specialties — including hurricane research.
Under Biden 1/3 of NOAA’s budget ($2B out of ~$6B) was devoted to climate change related projects. That involved all of NOAA’s agencies.
NOAA’s extensive climatism propagandizing is evident in their own online posts such as this 5/4/24 web page.
https://www.noaa.gov/news/new-noaa-climate-action-plan-emphasizes-needs-of-underserved-communities
Sorry how was research going to stop the accident?
a) You have to assume that in the couple of months since the cuts some great break thru was missed. Someone has already pointed out the cuts aren’t in place yet.
b) You have to assume that great break thru could be communicated to the community in time.
c) You have to assume they had a plan in place to do something
I would call your assertion ridiculous … Trump Derangement Syndrome.
If you want to blame something then you need to look back at the previous years and identify something that might have made a difference.
No cuts occur until AFTER October 1, the start of the new Fiscal Year. NWS had 5 metorologists on duty on a holiday weekend where there were normally only 2.
There were DOGE layoffs in late February and early March.
I do not have the specifics, but there is a lot of media yammering at the time about it.
No budget cuts until October 1, start of the next fiscal year. Correct.
NWS had added 3 meteorologists for the holiday weekend so 5 were on duty. Correct.
I should have made clear the point:
The Feb/Mar DOGE layoffs had absolutely nothing to do with this tragedy.
Having read all this, plus the original post at the Cliff Mass blog & its provocative commentary … I’m moved to (re)post this, from -18 hours ago, on the Open Thread, slightly modified here:
This [below] seems to be the best forewarning we had —
It’s from an NWS Meteorologist ‘Otto’ (based in Maryland), time-stamp 1:26 A.M. EDT (12:26 A.M. Central), or ~ 3+ hours prior to the deluge:
The narrative is heavy meteor- & topographical jargon.
The image (attached) is astoundingly complex, as it shows the mentioned two large portions of the circulation, as well as a scarier looking region in the mountains of the Chihuahua Desert (Mexican side of the Rio Bravo / Grande / Big Bend).
But his interpretation is peculiar: Not only the remnants of the Tropical Cyclone ‘Barry’ (originating from the SSE direction / Atlantic Basin / Gulf), but also the remnant effects of major Hurricanes ‘Flossie’ (cat 3 at peak) and before that ‘Erick’ (cat 4) from the SW direction / NW Mexico / Gulf of California:
——————
Of course, the urgent question is whether this was received & understood & transmitted by the nearest NWS Centers (at San Angelo & San Antonio) …
What we’ve seen live in the Saturday press conference (from Kerr County) was a question (hardly audible) to K. Noem, which she repeated as ‘[Was there] a failure of NWS to issue a timely warning?’ Her answer was to the effect that, YES, this is what we’re trying to address, this antiquated system.
[ Reminiscent of the response to the Air-Traffic-Control failures in the Helicopter-Jet disaster over the Potomac / Reagan National, a few months ago, a problem in relaying information to those who would be able to act on it. ]
She also said something like “… as in the case of Harvey …” referring to the major Hurricane (2017) remnants that wandered unpredictably around far-East-Texas, ultimately flooding a large region around Houston … but being on the low Coastal Plain was NOT flash-flooding as in a narrow river-valley of the Hill Country — more a case of property damage rather than loss of life.
Notably, she did not say anything political-sounding like ‘all the funding was diverted to the Climate Scare’ or DEI hiring etc. And the reason for that was obvious: the panic & grief all around was just too raw.
Have to add this, having been awakened by an especially intense thunderstorm at that (0400) hour, in NW-San Antonio (a good 40+ miles away from the devastating wall-of-water soon to come), we had been under flash-flood watches & warnings for many hours prior. Whether & how to evacuate abruptly to safer terrain, under those circumstances, would be a tough call in the middle of the night.
A barely-educated guess: the authorities require an advance forced-closing of those areas, whenever a tropical system is lingering. That won’t be a popular call.
?fit=300%2C225&ssl=1
Not quite sure what Secretary Noam was referring to when she stated “…this antiquated system” – NEXRAD? no, worked as designed; AWIPS II? no, worked as designed; GOES-18 & 19? no, worked as designed; river flow gauges? no, worked as designed; Mesoscale models (HRRR, NAM, etc.)? no, they forecasted the storms & their motion.
As for sirens in the area..sirens, by themselves are not enough. Someone, especially from out of town, won’t know if the alert is for severe thunderstorms, a tornado, flash flooding or something else. The alert system needs to be a siren/loud alert…followed by a voice message describing the alert, for example, the voicing of the text of the flash flood warning so the people out in the open wold know of the alert & move to higher ground. NASA has that system on our base here.
Right. From the context, her phrase ‘this antiquated system’ referred to communications:
Relaying the information in a form that the intended audience (local authorities) can understand well enough to can act on it.
Someone else has written, re this system:
How would you respond to that?
No doubt you’re correct about ‘Nobody … predicted that … an inexact science.’ But it’s another matter to convey what is actually happening, as it unfolds.
In pop sci-fi (Crichton’s State of Fear), that’s what saves the picnic crowd above Sedona from a flash flood formed near the top of Oak Creek Canyon: the info — specific, timely & local — is conveyed so that police see precisely what they must do to ensure a safe evacuation.
In this case, the ‘radar runs’ you mention, keeping in mind that catastrophe struck at 4 AM,* are narrated like this:
A. the specific conditions — a ‘Mesoscale Convective Vortex’ (looks much like a hurricane but over wet land)— emerges only after a ho-hum 9 PM alert.
B. At 12:26 AM comes a NWS–WPC (Maryland) Precip Discussion alert, which drastically increases the projected rainfall rates along the circulation’s perimeter. But at 1:14 AM, NWS Austin-San Antonio had issued a flash-flood warning, specific to that area (in Kerr / Bandera Counties) that estimates only 1-3″ additional rainfall there (beyond 1-2″ inches already fallen). Storm total ~ 4″ is major but not unprecedented.
C. Finally, at 4:03 AM, comes a critical “Flash Flood Emerg.”, which is already too late for the most acutely affected area of the Guadalupe River’s upper South Fork.
D. At 7:24 AM, a “Deadly Flood Wave” flashes — less a proper term than a cry of desperation.
THIS — what did or didn’t happen between 1:14 & 4:03 AM ? — is the concern (if any) of Local-State re the Fed / NWS communications.
[In some places, you’ll hear 5:30 AM but that must refer to far downstream, or other rivers, no?]
Here’s an account.*
Plus this:
And this:
[ there’s also a link to the press conference video recording, 33 minutes, but her comments quoted were in the Q&A, as I recall ]
Separately, there’s this statement, from the NWS Union Chief (Tom Fahy):
I installed smoke detectors/alarms with that capability.
Of course partisan Dems caterwauled wildly this weekend that this was all the fault of Trump firing forecasters and trashing weather radars. No matter how ridiculous and self serving these claims were, this is what passes for people who define everything in the universe in terms of partisan politics (note, however, that Republicans and MAGAs often do the same).
The reality is that flash floods (like tornadoes) don’t come with multiple days of warning as do slow moving tropical cyclones. Hours at best, if one is fortunate. And NWS assuredly provided those warnings the evening before that flood risk was high and to get up to high ground.
But, how do those warnings get communicated to individuals in harms way? Only local emergency responders and local broadcasters can do that, if at all. That is the rub. People don’t sit around constantly refreshing their device screens to find out the latest is from NWS or their local TV station weather forecasters. People have lives, and people do things that don’t revolve around the internet or TV.
Even when people are fairly and effectively warned, a too large percentage simply ignores the warnings, thinking “It won’t happen to me!”.
Most of the people who died here in the Fort Myers area in October 2022, when Hurricane Ian came storming ashore, had multiple days of warnings, particularly of very deep storm surges upwards of 15+ feet … yet they stayed in their beachfront homes thinking, “It won’t happen to me”. And then they died.
When Ian came ashore, its eyewall just a few miles from my thankfully-inland home, and the power and internet went out at my home, I remember listening to the battery-powered radio tuned to the local TV station broadcast, wherein people in the beach areas were calling in on live broadcast, crying that they were already up to the second story of their two story beach homes and the water was up to their necks, asking desperately for help or guidance on what to do. The best the shaken TV weather people could do was to tell them that they best get out of the house and up on the roof, because if they stayed much longer inside the home they’ll surely drown. Very heartbreaking … and very stupid.
I’m sure a siren like they use in tornado prone areas would have helped. But I completely agree with your point about complacency in the face of warnings from weather agencies. People have short memories and given that some government types love using manufactured hysteria (Kung Flu and Klimate Katastrophe) to get obedience many become inured to real physical hazards that exist world wide in many forms. It is good to know that overall death from weather events have been pared by 90 plus per cent over the last century even as local tragedies still occur.
When weather services issue repeated warnings for every possible event, one does begin to ignore the warnings. For example, we have had a week of “strong wind” warnings here in BC. It got a bit brisk and gusty, but no real danger.
Whether or not strong storm cells are possible, or even likely is known days ahead.
So you would have 20 million or 30 million residents evacuated in the south central Great Plains to the nearest high ground merely on the basis of NWS models showing lines of thunderstorms moving across the region in the coming days???
On that basis everyone in TX would have to be evacuated most of the time from February through, I dunno… November???
Get real. Anyone living in flood plain areas in hilly and/or rocky country in areas where local knowledge says those areas have flooded in the past needs to be aware of weather forecasts and be prepared to move to high ground. That could be only a couple hundred yards from the river’s edge. But even so, people can’t be glued to their iphones or TVs 24/7/365. Meaning sometimes some people are simply going to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, and will be victims.
Known? No. Projected or predicted, yes. Knowing and good educated guesses are not the same.
There were pop up text warnings on my phone that day. About the only possible problem was fatigue, as there were multiple warnings of possible flash floods. I live in that area.
I recommend this excellent and thoughtful analysis by Meteorologist Doreen Linder — https://x.com/DorLinder/status/1942023443605536824
A strong message. Her diction is clear, but quick. (Probably needs CC to be sure of every point.)
The timing as she described it, near the end, didn’t sound quite right for the upstream locales, maybe an hour later?
A meteorologist* just now gave a crystal-clear presentation of the topography under the particular storm cell that generated the flash flood, far downstream.
He emphasized the funneling effect, i.e. the compression of the many small streams (large catchment area) feeding into a riverbed narrows, thereby accelerating the front so that it forms a ‘wall-of-water’.
Elsewhere a gauge (located where?) records an abrupt (‘within two minutes’ — ? time resolution?) rise from a couple feet to ~ 20-ft depth, followed by a more gradual rise (over 20 minutes) to 35′. Local time at that first gauge / crossing was just about 4 A.M.
Miles downstream, at the village of Hunt or city Kerrsville, the effects come later, are more gradual, and the crest not so high.
*The Will Cain Show (Austin TX); name was perhaps ‘Norcross’ , perhaps it is streaming or posted somewhere.
I’ve lived in Texas for 62 of my 79 years, and have experienced high water many times, In 76, I was living in Smithwick, a little community between Marble Falls, and Jonestown. Had been a pretty good dry spell, and Lake Travis upper end had fallen in level back to the old Colorado river channel, exposing the rock work of the old Smithwick Mill race. A big rain–much like this event–(also in July IIRC) brought Lake Travis back up into the flood plain over night. A big rise. Living in the Liberty Hill area I saw both the North and South San Gabriel rivers over roads often. Where they join in Georgetown, big floods can and do happen if both are on a rise at the same time. It’s just the nature of the Texas hill country. When my daughter first told me about the tragedy down in the Kerrville area (she was stuck at home just north of Lampassas because the little creek that runs down beside her house had the low water crossing she needs to drive over to get out flooded) my first though was that someone in a responsible position at that camp had really dropped the ball. I suspect there will be some repercussions because of that. Anyone who builds in a flood plain WILL get their feet wet on occasion. As an old timer told me when I was buying a piece of flood plain property, and asked him how often that little creek flooded–It might not flood again in your lifetime, but then again ,it could flood three times this summer. I lived on that piece of property for 3-4 years, and while the creek did come up few time, it never did swamp the flood plain. Year after I sold the place, it flooded big time and took out every structure along that stretch. Momma nature rules.
Yes… with sympathy for those who’ve lost loved ones, I agree that “a responsible person really dropped the ball.” than Guadalupe River’s flood history.
As a summer camper and counselor in Colorado mountains, I understand and generally agree with the impetus to forbid the electronics, but with a history like this (see the 1987 event in Kerr County) they needed warning sirens. To John Hulquist’s comment below, re the question of “how close was safety”, a picture in the WSJ yesterday suggests it was within reach given, say, a 20 minute warning. The flood levels being reported were 20 – 30 feet above normal. A picture of a summer cabin near the river shows the hills (upper right) just behind it. The cabin and its occupants including two little girls in the cover story were lost.
https://images.wsj.net/im-40875787?width=700&height=700
The rest of the story:
Campsite: Pot O’ Gold Ranch
Location: Comfort TX (in Kendall County, not Kerr County, far downstream from Kerrville, from Hunt, from Camp Mystic)
They died during the course of evacuation
AI:
The trick will be for authorities to properly evaluate the flood history of their own stretch of the river and protect their constituents with whatever works. Sirens seem like a good idea, especially for the campers who have gambled on the floodplain. It’s easy to see the footprint of a floodplain. Benches with similar geological features are created over thousands of years. I feel sorry for these people, especially kids in their poorly-sited summer camps. But what to feel for the summer camp founders and owners, the developers and homebuyers investing in cottages along the river?
Go here: 30.009398, -99.370441 ~ ~ ~ See Camp Mystic
To the southeast, the hill is steep and 100 feet high. Two questions:
1. How high on the hill did the flood reach?
2. Could ½ hour warning allowed the people to go to above that height?
I’ve never been to the area and am 1,600 miles away, so have no perspective on the situation.
That image shows what appear to be dams on the river.
The hills appear to be less than half a mile away (more like 200-500 feet to the base of the hills).
Half a mile can take 10-30 minutes depending on a variety of factors, not the least of which would be rousing the campers, getting the moving, and ensuring everyone got out.
This is just like aviation disasters. Any speculation as to cause/blame/finger-pointing is so early that anyone engaging is more likely to have an agenda rather than answers.
Indeed, from climate change through DOGE to lack of electronics any one of which could be said (probably untruthfully) to be The One True Cause….
The AI engine “GROK” is a Left-biased CROCK…Do NOT Trust It
Grok-aganda
A flash flood wiped out Grok’s credibility. Good.
Don Surber
JUL 07, 2025
https://donsurber.substack.com/p/is-twitter-going-woke
The Elon Musk Artificial Intelligence engine “GROK” blamed the “One Big Beautiful Bill” and Donald Trump for cuts to the National Weather Service that crippled their ability to forecast the monster floods in Kerrville. Problem with that assessment is that NO CUTS have been made; those “cuts” do not take effect until NEXT YEAR and involve massive UPGRADES to the system and replacement of antiquated equipment.
Fox reported:
In the chaotic aftermath of the devastating floods at Camp Mystic on the Guadalupe River, Scott Ruskan, a Coast Guard rescue swimmer, is credited with saving 165 people in what was marked as his very first rescue operation.
A Coast Guard spokesperson highlighted his pivotal role among the 12 rescue helicopters, including those from the National Guard and the Army, that converged on the site.
He’s a genuine hero, which is why I posted his picture. We need something wholesome to get through dealing with a 35-foot wall of water wiping out so many people.
Ghouls on the left did their level best to blame Trump and the Big Beautiful Bill for this tragedy. Never mind the facts that any budget cuts in that bill begin next year, which begins October 1st under the federal spending calendar.
You and your facts…Democrats don’t want that.
Yes. Idiots are conflating the budget reconciliation legislation with the Feb/Mar layoffs.
It’s possible to do better.
Texas summer camp evacuates 70 people ahead of deadly flash floods | Fox News
Despite the absence of warning by local authorities, camp officials at Mo-Ranch acted quickly on their own, relocating about 70 children and adults staying overnight in a building near the river. With the kids safe, camp leaders including President and CEO Tim Huchton avoided the catastrophe that hit at least one other camp near Hunt, Texas
That’s great but … Not the same river, not the same watershed. [ North Fork, not South Fork ]
“Could It Have Been Avoided?”
YES,
Why didn’t Kerr County have sirens?
The county had considered outdoor sirens in the past but rejected the idea, citing cost concerns.
So they saved some cash & now at least 80 people have paid with their lives.
The officials who rejected the idea should be done for corporate manslaughter & never allowed in government again.
This was not just a bunch of pitched tents.
This was an established campsite with buildings and other infrastructure apparent in the google satellite imagery.
So yes. It should have been avoided.
Same issue with building homes in the Mississippi flood planes time after time after floods.
Don’t build in flood plains without super quality engineering to minimize flooding. It’s a huge state, what was the need to build in flood plains?
Don’t build in flood
plains without super quality engineering to minimize flooding.It’s a huge state, what was the need to build in flood plains?Fixed it for you.
Good work Cliff!
Politicians are trying to blame the Texas flood tragedy on Trump, by suggesting his cuts removed essential weather forecasters or by or rising CO2 for warming the atmsophere. However there were plenty of forecasters and they all warned of potential flooding 12 hours earlier. The real problem was those weather experts grossly underestimated the amount of rainfall. To be fair, it is extreme difficult to have predicted that a storm in the western Gulf of Americo would suddenly stall and then trigger an atmospheric river and it’s Total Precipitable Water that would deliver many times more rainfall into a Texas Hill Country known for flash floods. The atmospheric river (light blue) is easily seen on National Weather Service maps at https://earth.nullschool.net
The camp director tried to evacuate children once the disaster was unfolding but was found dead in his car along with three little girls…they tried but apparently got overtaken by the flood water.
Old Boy Scout rule. Once it is happening it is too late to evacuate.
One camp there (Mo Ranch) did evacuate. Mystic didn’t.
Been reflecting on this tragedy more, in a bigger context.
Warning sirens would have surely helped, but Kerr County decided not to install them in the flood plain. Penny wise but pound foolish.
Let’s be more specific based on a little research. A 15hp warning siren costs $14k and has an effective range of 1 mile. Installation is another $20k. Total $34k. The total length of the Guadalupe River in Kerr County is 38 miles. So warning sirens for the whole thing would cost about $1.3 million. The Kerr County annual operating budget is $67 million. So warning sirens for the whole river would have added just under 2% one time only to that budget.
Another adjacent camp DID evacuate. So the Mystic camp staff bears some direct responsibility. The media almost never assigns ‘obvious’ real responsibilities, perhaps out of lawsuit fear? Biden and Mayorkas bear direct responsibility for their open border, but you never hear that in MSM. The Laken Riley law tries to remedy the lack of NYC responsibility for her death at the hands of an illegal alien NYC released.
Dems still try to blame Trump despite abundant evidence to the contrary. Shows the politicization of just about everything these days.
Changed my mind. Now is not the time for political commentary. Not until after we mourn the dead.
The mayor I saw interviewed about the sirens said that the opposition to sirens was because of the possibility of false alarms. Apparently the area of Camp Mystic has very poor cell coverage so that could be why they didn’t get a warning?
As I’ve said before, the alarmist media is ready to pounce on every and any weather/climate extreme as incontrovertible proof of climate change—man-made of course. So it was a guarantee that government agencies at all levels would get more than their share of the blame for the death and destruction. Then there are the people who ignore the warnings possibly because they’ve seen too many of the extreme events predicted fail to materialize. They’re like people who drive too fast even though they’ve been warned about icy highways. Then when they crash, it suddenly becomes someone else’s fault. The weather services can’t do any more than issue warnings about possibly dangerous situations. It’s mainly up to citizens to decide exactly what precautions to take.
My mind backs up about 3 years to the Waverly tragedy in the TVA area. If I understand the history, that community was not protected by a flood control dam due to local opposition. (A number of other communities were protected and did not suffer serious damage.)
I don’t know if the geology of the area along the Guadalupe River would make a major flood control dam possible, or if there would be local opposition from the impoundment area of such a dam. But given the past history of flooding, perhaps it’s an idea that should be considered.
Examine the google satellite imagery of the area. It appears there are some kind of dams or gabions in place.
The flood wall was much taller by many feet than the banks of the river.
Not sure what it would take to control the water flow during such an event.
Why aren’t Media that are blatantly publishing misstated and misleading information losing their claim to be media under the 1st Amendment. It is clear they are political organizations.
Just from my memory I recall several times since the late ’70s that proposals were made to create flash flood water monitor system across Central/East Texas because of the regularity of severe flash flooding in the region. I think Austin and Houston Metro Area have set them up. I mean good gawd, Houston floods all the damn time.
As for notifications of sudden events, NWS has radio stations and a damned app for smartphone, hell, AccuWeather pings me with severe weather alerts for free. How anyone operating a large campground facility in a creek/river flood plain area not have 24/7 weather radio monitor set up and alarm loud enough to get someones’ attention is beyond me. I have family in Bandera and Medina county area, flash floods happen quite a lot, and it can be rain free and dry where you are standing and suddenly creek turns into a river.
One camp had an electronics ban.
Yes, there are ways to get the alerts where they are needed.
At 4:00 am, 20 minutes might not be enough time.
2 hours would have it the alerts were believed.
Electronics ban for campers. People running it would be fools not to have 24/7 weather radio monitor and individual handhelds for all staff, especially in a known flash flood zone. And each of those handhelds have NOAA Weather Alert feature built in. Hell, my old YachtBoy multi band portable has that. Lots of people dropped the ball on this, and people have lost their lives for it.
Would have to be short wave. Cell coverage, as reported, in that area was inadequate.
To top it off, the most recent prior flood was a mere 5 years ago.
There have been many floods in that area spanning decades.
No excuses. Preparations were non-existent.
Yep, a lot of people dropped the ball. As for a good radio, quite a few out there. Just not at WalMart. Have had my YachtBoy made by Grundig since the ’90s. Central Texas actually has a lot of AM and FM stations, people seem to forget about radio in the internet age.
The always excellent Roger Pielke, Jr. posted his analysis:
Do read it also.
Excellent analysis.
There is a link at the bottom from about a year ago that talks about modelers not taking advice to refine their scenarios. That, too, is worth reading.
The Big Thompson killed over a 150 people in 1976, but nobody blamed anything but the weather.
Lightning is many times the best warning. Watch upstream.
At 4:00 am, it is hard to see river water, especially when it is cloudy or raining.