(Hunt, Texas) Research continues on Monday in Texas, in the south of the United States, after the devastating floods which left more than 80 dead this weekend, including 27 children and supervisors who participated in a summer camp.
“The Mystic camp is in mourning with the loss of 27 campers and monitors after the catastrophic floods of the Guadalupe river,” said the organizers of this Christian summer camp for girls on Monday.
“Our hearts are broken alongside families who endure this unimaginable tragedy,” they added.
Kerr’s sheriff, the countless youth, announced the day before that at least 40 adults and 28 children had been killed there.
At least 13 other people have lost their lives in neighboring counties.
This assessment should further increase, warned the authorities.
Photo Ronaldo Schemidt, agency France-Presse
A volunteer is looking for missing people in Hunt, Texas, July 6, 2025.
“It is a disaster as we have not seen in 100 years and it is simply excruciating to see what is going on,” reacted Donald Trump on Sunday, saying that he would go “probably” on the spot on Friday.
The American president also refuted any link between budget cuts in national weather services and the heavy record in this highly frequented tourist region.
Residents complained over the weekend of not having been warned early in the risk of floods.
The meteorological services maintained their flood alert on Monday in central Texas until 7 p.m. local time (GMT midnight).
Desolation
The sudden floods were caused by torrential rains in the center of the state very early on Friday, the day of the American national holiday, which raised the waters of the Guadalupe of eight meters in just 45 minutes.
It suddenly fell nearly 300 millimeters/rain, a third of the average annual precipitation.
Photo Marco Bello, Reuters
People look at the Guadalupe river, after sudden floods in Kerrville, Texas, July 6, 2025.
On Sunday, the Guadalupe river began to find its bed and its calm, but the banks still offered a desolation show. On one of them, a dead cow was suspended from a tree, his head stuck in branches. Not far away, a car was overturned, while on the ground, dozens of dead fish, carried away by the current, entered decomposition.
Donald Trump, who dispatched his internal security secretary on the spot, Kristi Noem on the spot, signed a disaster declaration in order to provide Texas with the means of the federal government.
More than 400 rescuers, as well as helicopters and drones, participate in research, the authorities said.
In Hunt, the locality where the summer camp is located, 50 volunteers came from several cities in Texas to take part, in small groups of two or three.
Read “the peril behind the charms of the Hill Country”
One of them, Justin Morales, 36, told AFP that he had discovered with his companions the bodies of three girls, including one of the residents of the summer camp missing.
“We are happy to be able to help families mourn,” he said.
Sudden floods, caused by torrential rains that the dry soil cannot absorb, are not uncommon. But according to the scientific community, climate change caused by human activity has made meteorological events more frequent and more intense such as floods, droughts and heat waves.
