Let Mystic bring out the best in them, after the Texas floods
“We got no emergency alert. There was nothing" then "a pitch black wall of death”
As many gathered for the long weekend, terrible floods swept central Texas very early Friday morning. Among the known victims and missing persons still being searched for were girls attending summer camp at Camp Mystic.
Camp Mystic is a private Christian summer camp for girls.
The staff at Mystic strives to provide young girls with a wholesome Christian atmosphere in which they can develop outstanding personal qualities and self-esteem.
Each summer, Mystic challenges its campers to meet the Mystic ideals:
Be a better person for being at Mystic
Let Mystic bring out the best in them
Grow spiritually
Though several hundred in the area have been rescued, the latest reporting indicates nearly 120 are confirmed dead and more than 170 are still missing. Two days prior to the flooding, the Texas Division of Emergency Management did move state emergency response personnel and equipment to West and Central Texas in anticipation of heavy rainfall. Since the floods, more than one thousand local, state and federal personnel have been on the ground assisting the rescue operation.
According to AP News, a short timeline of events could be summarized as:
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 (8 meters) in just 45 minutes.
In response to questions about why the local community did not receive more warning or why more preparations were not made, Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha responded, “Those questions are going to be answered. I believe those questions need to be answered, to the families of the loved ones, to the public.”
All witnesses describe the event with horror. Matthew Stone said police knocked on doors at 5:30am but “We got no emergency alert. There was nothing" then "a pitch black wall of death.” Gustavo Valdes told CNN, “The screams is what haunts me. Every time I close my eyes I hear people screaming.” Captain Jason Waldrip of the Kerr County Sheriff’s Office spoke about the rescue efforts through the flood-ravaged ground of Texas’ Hill Country at a news conference today, “We have spotters on the ground. So as this material is being removed, we are looking for anything of a sign of a person that may be within this material.” First responders are working tirelessly to find dead bodies to help give families closure.
State officials have differing perspectives on the disaster response. Texas Governor Greg Abbott when pressed about “who’s to blame” pushed back on the criticism with “Know this: that’s the word choice of losers. Let me explain one thing about Texas, and that is Texas—every square inch of our state—cares about football.” As he continued talking about football, he points out that all teams make mistakes and only losing teams point fingers to blame while winners confidently handle their business. Not all in Texas government share the governor’s perspective. Democratic Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas responded, “This is not a game. People’s lives are at stake and the losers are the ones that don’t learn from the mistakes, that don’t hold people accountable. In this case, I think there are accountability issues at every level of government.”
While much is being made of Texas Senator Ted Cruz once again being on vacation while a disaster wreaked havoc on his home state, the federal response was never meant to be handled by the incapable hands of its elected federal representative. In 1979, President Jimmy Carter signed an Executive Order to create the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to coordinate government efforts and to provide resources, technical expertise and public communications support for all domestic disasters, whether natural or man-made. FEMA’s creation follows a 1968 law making flood insurance possible, a 1973 act making flood insurance mandatory in Special Flood Hazard Areas and a 1974 act to clearly establish the process of Presidential disaster declarations.
Yet the current administration feels very differently about FEMA’s value. FEMA is part of the Department of Homeland Security and its Secretary said today, “Federal emergency management should be state and locally led, rather than how it has operated for decades. It has been slow to respond at the federal level. It’s even been slower to get the resources to Americans in crisis, and that is why this entire agency needs to be eliminated as it exists today and remade into a responsive agency.” Putting aside the fact that the agency in question is Secretary Noem’s direct responsibility, her attitude is the exact opposite position of why successive Republican and Democratic presidential administrations advanced measures to make FEMA possible - because local and state governments need the federal government to effectively address domestic disasters.
Also today, Neil Jacobs, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), told Congress he believes the government’s response will be improved by retooling federal weather data collection processes through greater collaboration with private sector companies “to return the United States to the world’s leader in global weather forecast modeling capacity.” He went on to say at his confirmation hearing that the standard “will require embracing new technologies, novel approaches and partnering with industry to advance global observing systems.” The NOAA and FEMA work together on wireless emergency alerts, a nationwide effort to improve emergency preparedness.
The National Weather Service (NWS), which is part of the NOAA, lost nearly 600 staff this year as part of the Trump administration’s concerted efforts to reduce the size of the federal government. Among those no longer employed at the NWS was Paul Yura, the warning coordination meteorologist at the NWS's Austin/San Antonio office, whose duties included being a liaison between public safety officials, emergency managers and government officials. The warning coordination meteorologist is among 6 open vacancies at the Austin/San Antonio Weather Forecast Office.
A Kerr County government report last year warned the threat of flooding is getting worse and future floods could be more severe than historical floods. Samantha Montano, professor of emergency management at Massachusetts Maritime Academy, said “This is the exact kind of storm that meteorologists, climate scientists, emergency management experts have been talking about and warning about for decades at this point, and there’s absolutely no reason that this won’t happen in other parts of the country. This is what happens when you let climate change run unabated and break apart the emergency management system – without investing in that system at the local and state level.” To her point, a record-breaking flash flood just hit a New Mexico village yesterday killing 3 and damaging dozens of homes.
Last month, President Trump told reporters “We want to wean off of FEMA and we want to bring it down to the state level.” Both he and Secretary Noem have repeatedly expressed their desire to revamp if not remove the agency entirely. Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” signed into law last week cut $150 million of funding to the NOAA and created a special FEMA fund to help fund ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’ which is being used as an immigration detention center in Florida.
According to a June 2025 AP-NORC Center poll, more than 60% of respondents are confident in FEMA and 85% are confident in the National Weather Service. In terms of the government’s role in natural disasters, 72% believe the government should play a major role in ‘tracking weather events and warning people about natural disasters.’ Seventy-four percent believe the government should play a major role in ‘helping to rebuild communities affected by natural disasters,’ and 81% want the government to have a major role in ‘providing aid to communities in the immediate aftermath of natural disasters.’
Though national football teams - Houston Texans, Dallas Cowboys and Minnesota Vikings - have each contributed $500,000 to Texas rescue and relief efforts, the memories of those who died at Camp Mystic should not only be charity after the fact but a government effectively providing for the common defense before the next natural disaster hits.