Texas floods death toll rises to 32 as rescuers search for missing children

Authorities successful US authorities look questions astir whether they issued due warnings successful beforehand of rain-fuelled flooding.

Rescuers successful the US authorities of Texas are scrambling to find much than 2 twelve children inactive missing from a Christian summertime campy aft a almighty tempest caused flash floods that authorities accidental person killed astatine slightest 32 people.

Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha told reporters connected Saturday that the decease toll included 14 children.

Leitha said earlier successful the time that astir 800 radical had been evacuated from the region, astir 137km (85 miles) northwest of San Antonio, arsenic flood waters receded connected Saturday morning.

Torrential downpour connected Friday caused the fast-flowing Guadalupe River to emergence astir 9 metres (29 feet) adjacent the Camp Mystic summertime camp, wherever astir 750 children were staying.

Twenty-seven attendees were inactive unaccounted for, according to Dalton Rice, metropolis manager of the adjacent municipality of Kerrville successful Kerr County.

The Heart O’ The Hills summertime camp, located astir 1.6km (1 mile) from Camp Mystic, confirmed connected Saturday that its director, Jane Ragsdale, was among the dead.

While the National Weather Service (NWS) said the flash-flood exigency had mostly ended for Kerr County – the epicentre of the flooding – it warned of much dense rainfall to come, maintaining its flood ticker until 7pm section clip (00:00 GMT connected Sunday).

Rice said that much than 1,000 rescuers were connected the crushed to assistance with search-and-rescue efforts. Helicopters and drones were being used, with immoderate radical being plucked from trees. US Coast Guard helicopters had flown successful to assist.

“They are looking successful each imaginable location,” said Rice, adding that hunt crews were facing harsh conditions portion scouring waterlogged rivers, culverts and rocks.

People are reunited astatine a reunification centre successful the municipality of Ingram aft flash flooding deed Texas, connected July 4, 2025 [Eric Gay/AP Photo]

Reporting from Washington, DC, Al Jazeera’s Heidi Zhou-Castro said that rescue workers had promised to “not springiness up until the precise past idiosyncratic is recovered – either live oregon their assemblage is recovered”.

“That mightiness beryllium a gangly bid fixed conscionable however catastrophic these floods were. We’re talking astir a portion that is dotted with hills and with canyons,” she said.

She added that children successful the camps had been peculiarly susceptible to the floodwaters, “which roseate by 8 metres [26 feet] successful little than an hour, overnight arsenic they slept”.

Authorities nether scutiny

The flooding successful the mediate of the nighttime connected the Fourth of July vacation play caught galore residents, campers and officials by surprise.

Authorities person travel nether expanding scrutiny implicit whether they issued due warnings and whether capable preparations were made.

State exigency absorption officials had warned arsenic precocious arsenic Thursday that westbound and cardinal Texas faced dense rains and flash flood threats “over the adjacent mates days”, citing NWS forecasts up of the vacation weekend.

The upwind forecasts, however, “did not foretell the magnitude of rainfall that we saw”, W Nim Kidd, manager of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, said during a quality league connected Friday night.

“A batch of questions are being asked astir wherefore determination weren’t earlier evacuations,” said Al Jazeera’s Zhou-Castro. “They knew determination mightiness beryllium rain, they conscionable didn’t cognize wherever it would hit, and erstwhile it did, it so was catastrophic.”

On Saturday morning, US President Donald Trump said the national authorities was moving with authorities and section officials to respond to the flooding.

A drone presumption shows flooded houses pursuing torrential rains that unleashed flash floods on the Guadalupe River successful San Angelo, Texas, June 4, 2025 [Patrick Keely via Reuters]

“Our Brave First Responders are connected tract doing what they bash best,” Trump wrote connected his Truth Social platform, adding that Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem would soon beryllium connected the ground.

At a quality league alongside Noem connected Saturday, Texas Governor Greg Abbott said helium was expanding a authorities “disaster declaration” to get national assistance for counties affected by the floods.

“We volition guarantee that each plus and assets the authorities has is going to beryllium made disposable to each region that’s a taxable of this catastrophe declaration,” helium said, adding that Trump “loves Texas” and was “deeply acrophobic astir each the families who’ve been affected”.

The play catastrophe echoes a catastrophic flood astir 40 years agone on the Guadalupe River.

In 1987, a autobus and a van leaving a religion campy encountered floodwaters and 10 teenagers drowned trying to escape, according to a NWS summary of that incident.

Source:

Al Jazeera and quality agencies