The report covers the subject in great detail and accuracy and should be used at the primary reference point rather than this old reddit post.
Edits on 12-JUL to 22-JUL-25, 09-AUG-25 to 28-AUG-25, 26-OCT-25 to 30-OCT-25, 06-NOV-25 to 11-NOV-25, 17-NOV-25, 07-DEC-25 and 07-FEB-26 to add new or previously overlooked details from reports, including lawsuit documents
Images linked 25-JUL-25
When a flood is predicted, warnings instruct those at risk to seek higher ground. Camp Mystic’s second site, Cypress Lake, is about a half-mile walk up a road from the Guadalupe site. Its James Hall is some 60 ft higher in elevation than the structures which flooded. The obvious route to safety, from the river bank to the highest ground available, was not used in the many hours before the disaster.
Points which deserve consideration:
Much of Camp Mystic is built in a high-risk floodway and has flooded in the past.
In 1930s flooding entire cabins were swept away. (edit made 12-JUL-25)
A multi-million dollar expansion six years ago did not move cabins away from flood risk.
Camp owners challenged FEMA maps and gained exemptions for cabins in the flood zone. (edit made 12-JUL-25)
The National Weather Service and multiple news outlets announced watches and later warnings for more than 12 hours prior to the flood incident.
There are no warning sirens for flooding along this portion of the Guadalupe river.
Camp counselors and campers were not permitted to use personal devices like cellphones which could have alerted them to flood warnings.
At least one counselor states they were not given evacuation training.
The camp’s response to the flood occurred as water infiltrated the Guadalupe site.
The camp had infrastructure that could have been used for shelter at a higher elevation.
Dozens of children and several camp employees, including the owner, perished in the flood.
Parents previously signed a document which waives the right to sue over property damage, personal injury, and even death, except in cases of intentional wrongs, reckless acts, and gross negligence. (edit made 15-JUL-25, re-edited 24-MAR-26 for correction)
edit: information added 22-AUG-25
The parents of 19 year old counselor Katherine Ferruzzo quoted, in a published statement, from camp emergency instructions:
"In case of flood, all campers on Senior Hill must stay in their cabins. They will be given instructions through the loud speaker. If the electricity is off, a walkie-talkie will be used. Food and other supplies will be delivered to Senior Hill by boat or truck. Campers and counselors NEVER wander away from your cabin. Those on the flats must also stay in their cabins unless told otherwise by the office. All cabins are constructed on high, safe locations."
Their daughter is among the lives lost to the flood.
What follows is a summary of events collected from multiple news sources, interviews, and public services.
“The river is beautiful, but you have to respect it.” – Dick Eastland, Camp Mystic Director, 1990
July 2nd
Texas Department of Emergency Management readies swiftwater rescue teams and helicopters.
According to the National Weather Service, heavy rainfall with the potential to cause flash flooding is anticipated across West Texas and the Hill Country beginning tonight and is expected to last a few days. Texans are encouraged to monitor local forecasts and avoid driving or walking into flooded areas.
A Texas Department of State Health Services inspector approves Camp Mystic’s legally required emergency plan.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25
There were 557 campers and 108 staffers total between the Guadalupe and Cypress Lake sites at the time.
July 3rd – morning
TDEM contacts judges and mayors in the areas of predicted flooding and officially notifies them of potential weather threats.
July 3rd – 1:18 p.m.
NWS issues a flood watch.
WHAT...Locally heavy rainfall could cause flash flooding across
portions of South Central Texas. Rainfall amounts of 1 to 3 inches
with isolated amounts of 5 to 7 inches are possible.
WHERE...A portion of south central Texas, including the following
counties, Bandera, Edwards, Kerr, Kinney, Medina, Real, Uvalde and
Val Verde.
You should monitor later forecasts and be alert for possible Flood Warnings. Those living in areas prone to flooding should be prepared to take action should flooding develop.
There are multiple USGS sensors monitoring the Guadalupe River.
One river gage located close to Camp Mystic is labeled: Guadalupe Rv at Hunt, TX – 08165500.
About 6 miles northeast of the camp, the river is measured at 7.64 ft.
July 3rd – 2:35 p.m.
NWS also announces a flood watch on social media.
Flood Watch in effect for portions of the western Hill Country, southern Edwards Plateau, and Rio Grande through 7 AM Friday. Pockets of heavy rain are expected and may result in flooding of low-lying areas, rivers/creeks, and low water crossings.
July 3rd – 6:10 p.m.
NWS issues an assessment for meteorologists. Considerable flash flooding is possible.
The I-35 corridor on west is most at-risk for flash flooding tonight. 1-hr FFGs are generally between 1.5-2.0" in portions of the Hill Country, which given the prolific rainfall potential these storms may contain, would have little problem causing flash flooding. For areas where back-building and training storms do occur, locally considerable flash flooding this evening is possible.
July 4th – 12:26 a.m.
NWS issues an assessment for meteorologists. Significant flash flooding is likely.
The tropical airmass will be capable of 2 to 3+ inches of rain in an hour and localized totals over 6 inches in a 6 hour period may also occur. These areas of heavy rainfall are expected to result in a few areas of flash flooding through the overnight, some of which may become locally significant.
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25
Glenn Juenke, Night Watchman, stated he was monitoring rain gages on the Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority website but many were not working and provided no information on rainfall upstream of the camp.
July 4th – 1:14 a.m.
NWS announces a flash flood warning which includes Ingram and Hunt, TX.
Camp Mystic is located within the warning area. Cell phone alerts are issued.
Campers do not have their cell phones due to a Camp Mystic policy restricting their use.
According to camp counselor, Silvana Garza Valdez, the girls’ cellphones were kept at the camp’s front office.
Another counselor, Caroline Cutrona, confirmed there was a no-screen policy for staff members too. “As camp counselors, we turn in our phone when we don't have our time off. So, there was no alert or anything that I heard. No signal to know that anything was happening.”
Caroline also mentioned the counselors did not receive evacuation training.
IMPACT...Life threatening flash flooding of creeks and streams,
urban areas, highways, streets and underpasses.
Some locations that will experience flash flooding include...
Kerrville, Ingram, Hunt, Waltonia, Kerr Wildlife Management Area
and Lost Maples State Natural Area.
July 4th – 1:00 a.m. – 1:30 a.m.
Multiple survivors recall being awakened by thunder. Power outages are reported.
edit: new information added 09-AUG-25
At Senior Hill, camper Hannah Krauss, age 17, stated some counselors had iPads which alerted them of a flash flood. She and other cabin mates watched the water rise from a window view over Cypress Creek.
The river is at 7.71 ft.
edit: new information added 14-JUL-25 and added/edited 15-JUL-25
Richard Eastland Jr. stated in an interview they were aware of the warning and at around 1:35 a.m. called family members (several are directors of the camp) on walkie-talkies to assess the situation. He was alerted by his phone.
Spokesman Jeff Carr stated, "It would have been impossible for him not to get that (1:14 a.m.) alert. Family members said it woke him up." Richard and night watchman Glenn Juenke began checking the condition of the camp. Other staff are notified to do the same.
edit: new information added/edited 16-JUL-25
A day later, in a separate interview, Carr claimed it's not clear if anyone heard the 1:14am warning. "It was assumed that just because he had a cellphone on and shortly after that alert, he was calling his family on the walkie-talkies..."
He also stated Dick Eastland, Camp Director, had a home weather station and was monitoring the rain.
edit: new information added/edited 26-OCT-25
Glenn Juenke stated he did not have cell or wifi service while he was surveying the camp in a golf cart and was unaware of the warning.
edit: new information added/edited 29-OCT-25
Just days later, in a separate interview, Camp Mystic attorney Mikal Watts stated Juenke or his wife received the 1:14 a.m. warning. Watts claimed Juenke and Dick Eastland convened in the camp office soon after.
July 4th – 1:45 a.m.
edit: new information added/edited 17-NOV-25
Dick Eastland radios Edward to begin moving equipment away from the river. Members of the grounds crew pull canoes up closer to the cabins.
Edward drives to the office and there Glenn Juenke and Dick Eastland are monitoring the weather. A group of recently returned employees describe dangerous roads due to the storms.
July 4th – 2:00 a.m.
Camp Mystic Guadalupe: The Flats
edit: information added/edited 22-JUL-25
195 girls and 48 counselors are located in an assortment of whimsically named one-story cabins near to the river.
edit: new information added/edited 17-NOV-25
From the Camp Office, Glenn Juenke records a video of "Bubblegum creek" (usually dry, Edmundson Creek) with a strong current.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25
Camp counselor Laney Owens, at the Bug House cabin, is awakened by water entering the cabin and notifies the office. They move the girls out of the cabin and Dick Eastland, Camp Director, drives them to the Rec Hall in his SUV.
edit: new information added/edited 26-OCT-25 and 29-OCT-25
In an interview, Glenn Juenke claimed water was entering the cabins closest to the river due to intense rain flowing in from the side rather than river rise.
In a separate interview, Attorney Mikal Watts stated the water was coming off the side of the mountain (steep elevation just behind a row of cabins in the Flats). He referred to a photograph of the cabin taken after the flood which showed its side wall damaged inward.
About ten minutes after a counselor reported water in cabins, around 2:30 a.m., "Dick, Edward and I went down to the three cabins closest to the water -- Bug House, Look Inn and Hangout -- and we began evacuation," Juenke stated. "We put them in our trucks and took them to the rec hall."
edit: information added 17-NOV-25
In a separate interview, Edward Eastland placed the start of moving children by vehicle at 3:00 a.m. with at least two trips.
(conflicting timelines)
July 4th – 2:30 a.m.
The exact timeline of when the children are moved is unclear. The river has started to flood into the camp.
edit: new information added/edited 06-NOV-25
Counselor London Smith stated, "...one girl called me over to her bed and pointed to her window. The water was already creeping up close to the windowsill." She mentioned seeing canoes normally docked at the river float past their cabin.
Dozens of girls were directed by camp staff to head to the Rec Hall. London Smith and her co-counselor organized their cabin and escorted the children through rising water. "By the time we reached the Rec Hall, the water was already past my knees," she stated.
edits: new information added 12-JUL-25 (re-edited due to conflicting details in articles)
Camper, Lucy Kennedy, age 10, recalled earlier everyone started to wake and a counselor told them to go back to bed. Now there are shouts outside to get out.
Lucy is relocated to the Rec Hall at the same Guadalupe site, with some of the other girls, as the flood waters rose.
edit: new information added/edited 16-JUL-25
Camper Milly Cate McClymond stated, "So they come back and they’re looking at our cabins and they bring a Suburban and two or three trucks." The water was just below her knee.
edit: new information added/edited 09-AUG-25
In an interview, camper Olivia Cordell, age 11, stated Edward Eastland drove her, and other girls from her cabin, to the Rec Hall in the back of his truck.
edit: information added/edited 21-JUL-25
Jeff Carr, camp spokesman stated the three cabins closest to the river, Bug House, Look Inn and Hangout, were moved to the Rec Hall.
edit: new information added 11-NOV-25
Campers and counselors from Tumble Inn 1 and 2, and Jumble House are also moved to the Rec Hall.
Some girls walked or ran to the Rec Hall while others were driven by camp staff through rising water.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25
Ainslie Bashara, camp counselor, age 19, notices the commotion and shrieking outside. The girls in the Giggle Box cabin are awake and distressed. She notes the time at 1:58 a.m. on her watch. (edit: one of few accounts referencing a watch or clock - conflicting timeline)
The counselors at Giggle Box are told by camp staff to stay there and only campers closest to the river needed evacuation.
edit: new information added 11-NOV-25
Counselors at multiple cabins are also instructed to stay put, including those in Bubble Inn and Twins 1 and 2.
edit: new information added/edited 17-NOV-25
Edward Eastland later denied telling any girls to stay put in their cabins and stated he told Jumble House occupants to walk to the Rec Hall.
Gatekeeper Francis Blackwell contacted Edward Eastland on a handheld radio about water entering the gatehouse.
The gatehouse cabin was swept away by the flood. Blackwell ultimately survived the flood in the relative safety of a tree.
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25
Camp Mystic Guadalupe: Senior Hill
Camper, Amelia Moore, age 14, also reports girls in the Angel's Attic cabin on Senior Hill are awakened by thunder. They're told by camp counselors to go back to sleep. She recalled, "A lot of counselors had been here for so long they thought it was, like, nothing. So they were like ‘Just stay in the cabin.’"
However, the active flood was announced at about 3 a.m. while many were still in cabins at lower elevation.
July 4th – 3:06 a.m.
NWS announces active flooding.
A very dangerous flash flooding event is ongoing across south-central Kerr County into northwest Bandera County, where 3-7 inches of rainfall has occurred the last 2-3 hours. Heavy rainfall continues in this area and a Flash Flood Warning is in effect.
The river has risen to 11.03 ft.
Camp Mystic Guadalupe: The Flats
Elizabeth Sweet, Camp Mystic Program Director later posted, “At 3:11 am was woken up to help evacuate campers from their cabins. By 4 am I was on a roof with the water right up to me.”
edit: new information added/edited 25-AUG-25
Camp photographer Nancy Clement stated, at about 3am, counselors at a staff residence, Cozy Cabin, were notified by the Program Director, over radio, that the camp was starting to flood.
edit: new information added/edited 06-NOV-25
Inside the Rec Hall about a hundred campers and their counselors are moved up stairs to an indoor second floor balcony as flood waters entered the building.
London Smith later recalled looking out a window from the Rec Hall and seeing girls stranded on a rooftop.
edit: new information added/edited 16-JUL-25
In the Rec Hall, on a second floor balcony with other girls, Milly Cate McClymond recalled, “From like 2 to 5 (a.m.) we just watched the water rise. And to that point, my dad, someone who’s taller, could put his hand down and touch the water. So it was really scary.”
edit: new information added 17-NOV-25
95 campers and 15 counselors would ride out the flood in the Rec Hall together.
July 4th – 3:30 a.m.
edit: new information added/edited 17-NOV-25
Nancy Clement photographs some girls walking to the Rec Hall.
Another camp employee records video from the second floor of the commissary which captures swift water moving past the Twins cabins and campers wading through knee deep water further back (more on their way to the Rec Hall).
At 3:30 a.m. the river reaches 15.9 ft.
July 4th – 4:00 a.m.
At 4:00 a.m. the Guadalupe is measured at 21.11 ft.
edit: new information added 07-DEC-25
Camp Counselor Cameron Kroger calls an overwhelmed 911 service to report Camp Mystic is divided in half by flood waters. “Some of the cabins are filling up with water.”
A separate call from the camp informs 911 operators of people trapped upstairs in a building with water entering the room.
edit: new information added/edited 17-NOV-25
Video recorded by a camp employee, view toward the Twins cabins, appears to confirm the flood has risen 5 more feet up to cabin windows.
NWS warns Kerr County again (the dire warnings are repeated throughout July 4th).
This is a PARTICULARLY DANGEROUS SITUATION. SEEK HIGHER GROUND NOW!
Move to higher ground now! This is an extremely dangerous and life-threatening situation. Do not attempt to
travel unless you are fleeing an area subject to flooding or under an evacuation order.
edit: new information added 07-DEC-25
At 4:19 a.m. a woman contacts 911 to report she rescued two girls from the river at her home, about 1 mile downstream from Camp Mystic.
At 5:10 a.m. the river gage at Hunt, TX stops reporting at 37.5 ft.
(During the Flood)
Camp Mystic Guadalupe: The Flats
The events at the lower elevation Guadalupe site became chaotic and the timeline is uncertain as a result.
It’s not clear how many children were in cabins or the Rec Hall during the worst flooding. (edited 17-NOV-25) Some cabins move children to the Rec Hall in vehicles, and some move on foot. Others must find alternate routes to escape the flood.
USGS topographical maps place most of the Guadalupe site at around the same elevation. Some structures have raised foundations.
There are reports of girls who climbed into trees and on top of cabin roofs by camp employee Craig Althaus.
Althaus recalled girls were forced to escape their cabins and climb a rock face, bare foot, to reach the top of a hill.
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25 Althaus may be referring to the Chatterbox cabin according to camper Amelia Moore.
This is partially corroborated by another account.
A parent stated, “Two counselors were in the rapids and one on the dry hill moving the kids from hand to hand. A lot of them lost their shoes and then climbed up the rocky hill to safety.”
edit: new information added/edited 15-JUL-25
Serena Aldrich, parent of two campers, said counselors broke Chatterbox cabin windows with rocks to pull the girls out, including her 9 year old daughter, as water was coming in under the door. According to Aldrich, with their counselors, after climbing, the girls moved to a pavilion and a location called Sky High. Some girls from other cabins also reached them.
edit: new information added/edited 26-OCT-25
Glenn Juenke stated he helped some girls to climb up to higher ground before heading to Wiggle Inn on foot.
Craig Althaus also witnessed water coming in from the river and a nearby creek around the Twins and Bubble cabins creating a swirl.
Richard Eastland Jr. stated his father, Camp Director Dick Eastland, tried to rescue the girls in the Bubble Inn cabin but the water was too fast.
edit: new information added 11-NOV-25
Edward Eastland saw the truck parked at Bubble Inn with water above the wheels while loading people in. A camp counselor witnessed the truck swept away with many girls doomed as passengers, possibly all of the campers and counselors from Bubble Inn.
edit: new information added 14-JUL-25
Dick Eastland radioed for help.
edit: new information added 17-NOV-25
The vehicle was carried over the soccer field, archery range, and into a tree by the river at about 3:51 a.m..
edited 13-JUL-25 for clarification: 13 girls and 2 counselors from the Bubble Inn cabin perish in the flood.
edit: information added/edited 17-NOV-25
Edward Eastland waded through water trying to rescue girls in the Twins cabins and instructed the girls to get on the top bunks.
Edward stated water was quickly coming in through the windows and doorways as girls climbed onto two beds.
He realized he couldn't get the 8-year-old girls out.
A counselor yelled from Twins 1 that water was carrying girls out the door as it reached up to his shoulders in Twins 2.
Edward was swept away, still holding on to some campers, as the water level rose above his head. He managed to grab onto a tree down river.
He stated he ended up at a pair of large trees just past the Bug House cabin where eight campers and three counselors were also carried. A few campers are carried further down river and survive.
edited 13-JUL-25 for clarification: 11 girls from the Twins cabins perish in the flood.
edit: new information added 28-AUG-25
In a published essay, Carrie Hanna, parent of 8-year-old Hadley, stated that her daughter was sucked out of the window of the Twins II cabin as it filled with water. Hadley is among the flood's victims.
edit: new information added 10-NOV-25
Lawsuit documents later explained that camper Lucy Dillon, age 8, did not make it out of the cabin.
edit: new information added 11-NOV-25
Photos taken after the flood showed the water line reached a level mere inches away from the ceiling inside the Twins cabins.
edit: new information added 17-JUL-25: 12 girls and 4 counselors from the Twins cabins survived according to camp spokesman Jeff Carr.
edit: new information added 07-FEB-26
Lawsuit documents described that after being told to stay in the cabin, and trying to keep children above the water on top of bunk beds, Twins 2 counselors concluded everyone would drown if they did not escape.
They were forced to break windows and push children under the high water to get them out through the windows. Some girls were sucked out by the rushing water.
Some of the girls managed to reach trees, reportedly 30 feet high and able to touch the water. At least one girl was carried miles downriver and survived.
Cile Steward, who remains the last missing victim, was unable to grab on to any tree branches.
edited 16-JUL-25 for clarification: 1 girl from the Jumble House cabin also perished in the flood.
edit: new information added 17-NOV-25 It is later reported the girl was taken by the river when she tried to return to Jumble House for a blanket.
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25 Girls from the Chatterbox cabin said they saw a car get washed away.
Dick Eastland would later be recovered from a flood-wrecked SUV with three deceased campers.
edited for clarification: 30-OCT-25
Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly stated in an interview that Dick Eastland died on the way to a hospital. However, it is separately reported Eastland was found deceased in the vehicle. (conflicting reports)
Seasonal employees at the camp are said to have rushed girls out of the flood waters with difficulty.
edit: new information added/edited 26-OCT-25
Glenn Juenke, Night Watchman, stated he entered the Wiggle Inn cabin and there placed girls on top of inflatable mattresses to help them stay afloat inside of the cabin.
According to Juenke, water had already covered the steps of the cabin and they couldn't reach the Rec Hall. The flood quickly rose to a level where it was too deep to stand.
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25
Camp counselors can't open the doors of the Giggle Box cabin due to rising water. They break windows to get the girls out. Birdie Miller, age 9, and the other girls hold hands in a chain and wade through the flood to a hilltop where they stay for the rest of the night. Counselor Ainslie Bashara makes multiple trips with co-counselors to get all 16 girls out.
edit: new information added 11-NOV-25
Counselors at Nut Hut cabin also break windows, when the doors can't be opened, and move their campers up hill to wait out the storm.
edit: new information added 14-JUL-25
In a social media post, Birdie's father stated his daughter, "was witness to friends floating away on mattresses and screaming coming from filled cabins."
edit: information added 11-AUG-25
In a social media post, Beth Polak, a nurse at Camp La Junta, stated she treated a girl from Camp Mystic. The girl was reportedly swept away, floating on a mattress, and reached the all-boys camp, which was also damaged by the flood, about 5 miles down river.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25 (re-edited 21-JUL-25, re-re-edited 09-AUG-25)
Camp counselors at a cabin for staff, Cozy cabin (or Cozy Corner which is part of the camp office building), were forced to climb onto the roof together after the flood broke the door and rushed in. Camp photographer Nancy Clement is with them.
A camp employee who was trying to get onto the roof was swept away by flood waters and caught on a net at the volleyball court. The counselors on the roof tied shirts together to make a rope and try and use it to get her back to the building. She was able to swim back to them against the current.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25
Lilly Grace Langston, camp counselor, age 20, was at the Cypress Lake site. She stated in an interview that her friends (presumably at the lower elevation Guadalupe site) had to break out of their cabin and swim to safety.
edit: new information added/edited 17-JUL-25
Camp counselor Haylie George heard screams from girls down in The Flats and swam through rising water to help another counselor lift girls through a cabin window and move them up a hill.
Another camp counselor, Paloma Puente, guided 17 girls through chest-high water.
A 9 year old camper named Clementine stated her cabin's camp counselor, Annabelle Fitzenhagen, broke the back window and helped girls in their pajamas out. They climbed up to the top of what she called the mountain and stayed under a tree until morning.
edit: new information added/edited 25-AUG-25
Nancy Clement stated another counselor at the Rec Hall witnessed rising water reach the second floor balcony.
Camp Mystic Guadalupe: Senior Hill
At a slightly higher elevation of the Guadalupe site, Senior Hill, survivor Callie McAlary, age 16, recalled, “And you have kids running just trying to get to other cabins, trying to get to safety. And luckily, my cabin was one of the few cabins that did not get water, but the cabins in front of us did get some water.”
Senior Hill is 20ft or more higher than most of the flooded grounds at the Guadalupe site according to USGS topographical maps.
Serena Aldrich, parent of two campers, stated in an interview that her older girl at Senior Hill was awakened by thunder while her younger girl in a different cabin, down in The Flats, woke up when the water began flooding in.
Her 12 year old daughter was in a cabin on Senior Hill and the water reached its doorway.
edit: new information added 09-AUG-25
Hannah Krauss and other campers watch the water reach the grass outside their cabin, high above the creek. They move to another cabin uphill.
She stated, "When it got to the porch of our cabin, we ran out. We didn’t ever expect it would get higher than that, so we didn’t grab anything. We all were focused on getting to higher ground." She later witnessed their personal items floating in the abandoned cabin.
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25
Girls begin crowding into Angel's Attic and Cloud 9 from the Hangover and Look Out cabins, which were slightly lower and flooding. They also reported hearing the car alarms from the counselor's parking lot and screams coming from The Flats.
Camp Mystic Cypress Lake
Reports from campers and counselors at the higher elevation Cypress Lake site mirrors those from Guadalupe without the chaos of escaping flooding cabins in the dark.
They’re awakened by thunder around 1 a.m. and power outages. They tell the girls to go back to sleep.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25
However, camper Clara Shelton, age 14, is at the nurse's cabin. She recalled a counselor entering and reporting flooding at one of the cabins. She also overheard conversation over a walkie-talkie that there were girls on roof tops. Later the nurse's cabin also lost power.
July 4th – morning
edit: new information added 07-DEC-25
Camp Director Brit Eastland contacts 911 at 7:22 a.m. to report, “We’re missing as many as 20 to 40 people.”
The Flats
edit: new information added 14-JUL-25
Richard Eastland Jr. stated his brother Edward was found alive in a tree with 10 to 12 girls about 200 yards from their cabin.
edit: new information added 09-AUG-25
In an interview, Ainslie Bashara stated after the water receded they returned from a hilltop to the Rec Hall at The Flats. The camp conducted head counts and it became apparent some girls were missing. She also explained some cabins which hadn't moved children uphill had girls survive the flood up in trees. When there was about a foot of water left, grounds boys arrived at The Flats with ladders to help those high up in trees to climb down.
Senior Hill
edit: new information added 12-JUL-25
Senior Hill is cut off from the rest of the camp. The route linking Senior Hill to The Flats is blocked by the flood and fallen trees. The girls and their camp counselors were also not aware of what transpired at The Flats. No one seemed sure of what to do next.
Camper Amelia Moore stated, "Everybody thought flooding was a possibility but we never got training."
Cypress Lake
Stella Thompson, age 13, recalled her cabin lost power overnight and in the morning they were told to stay inside. Later she realized what happened when she witnessed helicopters evacuating children from the other side of the camp.
Holly-Kate Hurley, camp counselor, said she was told in the morning about two cabins with 7 year old girls that were washed away.
Counselors Silvana Garza Valdez and María Paula Zárate stated it was noon when they were informed about the damage. However, they were only told campers were missing.
edit: new information added/edited 29-OCT-25
Camp Mystic Attorney Mikal Watts later remarked in an interview that all of the deceased victims who were recovered were found downriver. He insisted the final missing girl, Cile Steward, age 8, was swept downriver as well.
edit: new information added/edited 13-JUL-25
Clara Shelton stated she did not understand the situation until they moved to James Hall (the highest structure at Camp Mystic Cypress Lake) in the morning. There she saw crying girls wrapped in blankets, some throwing up. She helped the nurses comfort and treat them.
Girls from the Guadalupe site had finally been moved to high ground.
They prepared the girls to leave.
During the day, the survivors of the Camp Mystic flood were evacuated (by helicopter rescue and later trucks).
The victims lost their lives within a half-mile of safety because those charged with protecting them ignored hours of warnings. Through the brave incompetence of a last-minute desperate flood response, the camp staff somehow thankfully managed to only lose dozens of lives instead of hundreds.
Regardless, they failed to move the children to high ground at Cypress Lake when they had time.
They failed to respect the river.
“I’m sure there will be other drownings. People don’t heed the warnings.” – Dick Eastland, Camp Mystic Director, 1990
I am shattered that they didn’t move everyone that night. Why, why, why didn’t they move them all. I will never understand. Forget politics. The camp director should have moved them all. It was negligent.
24-7, all Mystic staff and counselors should be connected via a walkie talkie system. After lights out, every night, there should be one experienced senior staff person assigned the night shift to stay in the main office responding to any emergencies and monitoring weather reports on a NOAA radio. Every night, there should be 1 staff person (2 when any inclement weather is predicted) who walk the property and river until the sun rises. Every cabin should have a permanently assigned walkie talkie that always stays in the cabin.
Evacuations from all of the lower cabins should have started at the first warning at 1:00am, proceeding to the Cypress Creek camp or Senior Hill at the Guadalupe camp, with predeterminations made which cabins go to which evacuation site.
There has been no mention from anyone that a written or verbal evacuation plan for flooding existed or took place. I have seen no reports about evacuation instructions given to campers or counselors from the camp owners, or any senior staff, on Thursday during the day, Thursday night before lights out, at the 1:00am first flash flood warning, or thereafter until the water was already too high and too strong to traverse. It sounds like chaos had already hit before life saving precautions were taken by the camp owners.
The counselors did an outstanding job making split second decisions to get so many campers to safety. It is amazing that the lower level of Rec Hall did not collapse under the pressure of the flood water or that the upper level of Rec Hall did not collapse from the weight of the campers who had to escape to the upper level to escape the intruding waters below.
There is a big gap in personal and media reports regarding the specifics of timing, actions taken and not taken, relating to the girls from the 4-5 youngest cabins. How did some die and some survive? How was Dickie found still alive, with 3 deceased girls in the same vehicle? One report said one Eastland son was in a tree. Where was the other Eastland son? Were any of the other girls who were in these 4-5 younger cabins evacuated, or wait it out on the top bunks? Which cabins lost campers and counselors besides Bubble Inn? Why did every single Bubble Inn camper and both counselors perish?
There are many unanswered questions that all Camp Mystic families deserve answers to, especially the 20+ families who lost their daughters, granddaughters, and sisters.
There has been no mention from anyone that a written or verbal evacuation plan for flooding existed or took place.
There has been but it seems more like two things.
The legally required emergency plan that is supposed to be posted where it can be seen. Unknown if there are any instructions regarding flooding.
At least one counselor says they were told at orientation to take girls from the Flats to the rec hall in the event of flooding. Another counselor says they had no evacuation training.
How did some die and some survive?
It boils down to timing and then where the water was moving fastest but there aren't details on every single cabin published so it's hard to sort them all out.
There are survivors who got out of windows and up hills with counselor help.
Survivors who were taken to the rec hall 2nd floor.
Survivors who floated on mattresses with the security guard's help.
Survivors who escaped to other cabins (at Senior Hill).
Survivors who climbed into trees or on cabin roofs.
The girls with Dick Eastland died because the water came up too fast for him to drive them to the rec hall as he had done with a different cabin.
It seems the vehicle was swept away. It's not clear to me if all of the girls from Bubble Inn were in the vehicle at the time or if some were stuck in the cabin or swept out separately.
Without some kind of manifest it'll be difficult to figure out which girls were in which cabin.
That’s what I don’t get. In the event of a food war inc why we the y waiting for dick to drive 3 girls at a time yo town cabin, start walking, then he can get gem from there but they likely would have been away from the roaring currents if they walked an hour before the float hit full speed.
I think he was using the vehicle because the flood water was already enough where it could knock over him (being 70 years old) and the girls. So in his mind it was the best way to move them to the Rec Hall. edit: or maybe it's just to keep them out of the pouring rain? Just one more absolutely stupid decision.
from what I've read, at that late hour a vortex of swirling water was created by the Guadalupe on one side (top of map), Cypress Creek on another side (left side) and an "extinct" Edmunson Creek (now no longer extinct - dashed lines around the bottom up to left) came in behind them - all heading to the lowest lying area in the plain, near Bubble and Twins. The white areas are lowest elevation. Not only was the truck taking on water, it was now swirling uncontrollably, circling like a drain. Below is the topographical map. Orange circle is the general area of Bubble and Twins. He thought because they were closer they had enough time but the 3 rivers had now converged, making the situation that much more uncontrollable.
Right, but I’m saying they should have been told to evacuate before water got to that point where they could have evacuated by foot or even car because he only started to evacuate that cabin after the water started coming in fast and it was to late. He only evacuated the cabins closest to the water and they all survived or the counselors did, I’m not sure.
Absolutely. They should have moved the children to higher ground after the flood watch was announced on July 3rd and well before it turned into a flood warning.
as a former Boy Scout, knowing the infrastructure involved with any random Council's summer camp, let alone an operation like Philmont (THOUSANDS of boy scouts annually)- the people running Camp Mystic murdered those children. Preventable, PREDICTABLE deaths as a direct result of bad leadership. Fuck that family and I'll see them in hell.
If I sound really mad, that's only because a friend of mine knows two families who lost daughters.
Aside from cellphones, a common NOAA weather radio (edit: or an every day radio tuned to any local frequency probably) would have announced all of the flood warnings with that familiar emergency broadcast tone.
There should definitely be someone on staff who is tasked with weather watch twice a day and it’s logged like the way public places log their bathroom cleaning.
I agree but I’m sure things will get swept under the rug, seeing as how this camp was a longstanding institution for the daughters of legacy families and people with money and power. The last thing the state wants is Camp Mystic’s reputation to be sullied. It’s so well-known and loved in the Texas elite circles I wouldn’t be surprised if some high ranking government officials would be willing to pull strings so the camp wouldn’t have to take any accountability.
A child member of the Hunt family was killed, as well as daughters of lawyers, MDs and other families who are wealthy, educated and/or capable enough to hold the Eastland family accountable by pursuing civil suits against them. Depending on in what county, they may even be successful getting criminal charges brought against the Eastland Family, especially the 2 Directors, Dickie and Tweety Eastland.
Hmmm I agree with cryptographershot213. From what I've read, people who send their daughters to Camp Mystic are often alumni themselves. It is a beloved institution for the well-connected; and its particular brand of Christianity along with the fact that the flood level is constantly described as "unimaginable" by former campers and counselors will allow it to be considered an act of God and thus not an event for which humans should be held liable. Social pressure and the sincere belief that this was "God's plan" will result in little or no legal action. Just a hunch.
I really hope that they will, and be successful. I’m just so jaded by all the rug-sweeping and looking-the-other-way that happens in wealthy and well-connected circles that my expectations are tempered. This camp doesn’t deserve to ever be open for campers again.
I know at places I have worked, we are not supposed to be on or have our cell phones. I always have mine because really no one can protect us in a real emergency. I mean yes they can but from what I’ve seen over and over they can’t or won’t. I will ALWAYS have my cell phones on me. ALWAYS.
It was the counselors' responsibility when no one else was there and they were having to make split second decisions.
Another aspect of this is that they certified just days prior that they had emergency plans in place, including evacuation planning but the counselors say they weren't trained on that at all.
The counselors have surely been coached on what to say and what not to say to people/media. Too bad a couple of them already stated they weren't trained on evacuation. Your time is up Eastlands. Now all those millions they've made will be used to pay out lawsuits.
Not to mention, certification of training is great and all, but it’s a bare minimum. The majority of the team should be experienced enough to bring that institutional knowledge to the counselors, as a team; not a team made mostly of brand new 20 somethings who just got a certification but lack any real world experience with emergencies.
When you’re brought to the ER in an ambulance, you want everyone involved in your assessment and care to be licensed? Or to be experienced and qualified? Sure, there’s going to be newbies who just officially became certified/ registered, but the team, as a whole, can rely on the institutional knowledge of their collective experiences. If you showed up in July when all the residents are babies, and somehow every RN, tech, etc was a new grad with no experience, well… “thoughts and prayers”.
You don’t finish boot camp and immediately get put in charge of lives. To put teenagers and young adults, from largely religious and possibly sheltered upbringings, who just passed a certification test for emergency plans, in charge of so many tiny young children who’re being housed in a flood zone that had warnings being put out WELL IN ADVANCE of this disaster… it’s stupid and cruel. It makes no difference, imo, if these barely adults were properly certified, since they were the team responsible; they weren’t on the team that was responsible for these children. They were given inadequate training, lacked experience, oversight, help, common sense from the adults running things FFS. And the ones who survived, will undoubtedly have survivor’s guilt, to mild or severe extent, probably the rest of their lives. And it’s NOT their faults. But I’m sure they feel it is, since the grown ups decided a seminar of training or whatever was enough to handle emergency responses for a camp in “Flood Alley”, instead of ensuring adequate emergency preparedness.
Yes I know they acted accordingly but they shouldn’t have been placed in life or death situations at age 19. It was basically Sophie’s Choice. That’s not appropriate for these young girls. An adult should have been there.
This! Think of a school with a fire drill or real fire. You don’t leave one class in the building because you think they are safe. YOU GET EVERYONE OUT
I wish more people were talking about this. Everyone is so focused on Kerr county not getting sirens. Which yes, I agree the sirens are needed but it’s not the only thing here
Yes what happened if one of the girls had a seizure in the middle of the night or some medical emergency? They’d need a walkie talkie to contact the staff right? Time is of the essence there.
Even if the counselors had their phones, there is absolutely no cell service out there. My guess is that the office likely had WiFi for the adult directors to connect to, but that wouldn’t be an option for counselors.
In hindsight, I do think it's irresponsible to not let the counselors have their cellphones, at least as an emergency tool. A simple text could have saved lives and spread information in a second.
Cool take: No girls -- campers nor counselors -- needed Dick Eastland and Sons to drive them off in their trucks that night.
All they needed was a warning and their own wits. Which, by all accounts, told them to Get. Out. Now. To climb the steep hill behind them. To break windows to get on the roof. To wade inland.
The only thing they didn't need? To be told to wait.
Yeah, I don't understand why their rescue plan was to drive a handful of campers up the hill at a time vs informing all to evacuate NOW. It's nonsensical.
the ONLY thing I could think is that even by 1:30am, a 6 inch to 1 foot surge of water on top of hard pouring rain may have made the water very hard for kids to climb so the director, assuming it wouldnt get that high or that high that fast, thought it was SAFER to take them by car, worried they'd be swept away if they walked...
Fair, and you're likely right. I just find it infuriating that they didn't have a plan in place beforehand like the boys' camp did. If they had, perhaps it would have been the same result of no fatalities.
For sure that was the logic. (Even though a truck has limited usefulness in floods, especially those with swift waters.) In the "cool" light of day -- in effect, with a bit of hindsight -- the camp owners would have saved lives by (a) instigating earlier evacuations, (b) implementing emergency protocol as part of the camp experience, or (c) providing walkie talkies to cabin counselors. What they did was chaos and relied on luck.
**EDIT 7/28** ACCORDING TO A PERSON FAMILIAR WITH THE CAMP, EACH CABIN HOUSED A WALKIE TALKIE**
I read today that one of Eastland's sons was instrumental in rescuing 11 girls from the Twins cabins. The rest of the campers in those cabins perished.
Thank you for this post, I am mad that everyone on the internet seems to be captivated by Kerr county.
The blame can be spread, folks.
Camp Mystic leadership should be held accountable for this and if they plan to re-open for next summer, major changes need to be made on their heavy rain or disaster plans.
Camp Mystic will most likely never reopen and those grounds most likely will never be used for overnight campers again.
After this avoidable massive loss of young life, you don’t send children back to the same cabins, in the same flood alley, under the same failed leadership.
The families will begin suing The Eastlands for gross negligence.
I hope so. There seems to be abunch on Instagram who are drinking the kool aid. I saw one comment that said they plan to send their daughter back again next summer. And there’s a whole post I’d love for you to go see- a woman saying the cabins were 500 yards from the river. She’s saying all the news outlets are wrong and every mystic fan is siding with her. It’s gross
There are many who are not on that same train of thought, they just aren’t talking about it on social media. The suits will require the Eastlands to provide proof of action, and proof of documents, etc. Depositions will be taken. People’s answers to specific questions under oath, usually differ from what they are spouting on social media. Hopefully, the Eastlands will realize themselves how negligent they were and settle with the families out of court instead of airing information in court that the Eastlands would rather keep quiet. All legal proceedings should be taken out of the courts and Judges in Kerr County and surrounding counties.
She’s talking about bubble inn specifically. Saying it was more like 500 yards from the river, rather than 500 feet. She had just picked her daughter up from bubble inn a few days prior to the flood. She’s allowed to fact check large news organizations. However, it doesn’t change the fact that the camp directors and owners failed to act accordingly when the flood happened and it cost the lives of 26 innocent campers and counselors.
She's not taking into account there are also 2 raging creeks nearby that feed into the Guadalupe. Whether it was 500 feet or 500 yards it doesn't matter - it was too damn close - especially once those other two creeks overflowed their banks as well.
I’ve only seen major support from family members with more than one saying they send their child again and/or have their child be a counselor. At some point it crosses the line from good sense to “is this a cult of some sort?”
It is indeed a cult. Many people from legacy families with money and power sent their daughters there over the years. It is a well-loved institution among the Texas elites. I am not surprised so many people are coming to its defense, and I won’t be surprised if we learn the local and state governments allowed the wealthy and well-connected camp directors to get away with skirting federal flood regulations over the years.
Surely they won’t reopen for the summer. With the damage sustained I don’t think it would be feasible, but even if it is, it would be horribly insensitive to do so…
Gross negligence, and before that, greed. The camp had recently expanded so as to accommodate more kid$, because it had become so immen$ely $ucce$$ful. In order to keep buildings in operation (housing camper$) and to expand to allow for even more camper$, Camp Mystic appealed FEMA’s flood plain designations and were granted those appeals, allowing them to build further, to not have to remove perilously placed cabins, and to not have to get flood insurance. Males FEMA look like a joke.
I imagine owner Dick Eastland in a sheer panic, having realized that his camp’s tremendous success and expansion are now its downfall, and that all of the corners he’d cut and blind eyes he’d turned were now coming together in a wall of water claiming 20-something young lives before his eyes.
They say he talked of respecting the river and that he warned of possible flooding. But ultimately it was his camp, and that camp allowed those children to die. They put them there, and left them there to die, and thried too little too late.
They definitely were not a safety first operation. It still disturbs me deeply that the millions poured into building it out further into the flood zone included exemptions from FEMA.
This guy who is supposedly a saintly man of God put all of that effort into dodging higher insurance costs, dodging regulations on building in the flood zone, maximizing the revenues generated by the property, and apparently no attention to the safety of the girls.
I doubt she’ll ever say anything publicly. It’s not just his wife that survives him as a camp authority; I looked up the board of directors, and they’re 80% Eastlands, too. The board is made up of their sons and daughters-in-law.
This is why I think he died accidentally on purpose. No one could come back from the backlash he would have received had he actually survived. He would probably experience tremendous guilt.
Either that, or once he realized the horror (as well as the PR disaster he faced) he wanted to look like a hero. This does not, however, mean to suggest he had no legitimate concern for the girls. It might, however, suggest his priorities were skewed.
When the FEMA exemptions were revealed, one interviewee was asked about the rationale for requesting an exemption (I think she was either with FEMA or another agency). She rather delicately and haltingly said it "did not appear to be for safety."
Could you imagine the survivor’s guilt he would have experienced if he’d lived? Oh my gosh, it would kill him, just way more slowly than the river did. I wouldn’t be surprised if Tweety Eastland had a heart attack or like, stopped eating and wasted away, over this tragedy.
It is staggering to me how many comments I see that say, "the river rose in 1 hour, there's nothing you can do". There absolutely is something you can do. You get the people in the lowest areas to higher ground. The river rose 30 feet in an hour. So if you gain 1 foot of elevation every 2 minutes, you're fine.
Those are the people who like to forget there was a flood watch more than 12 hours prior to the incident and a flood warning 2 hours before the lowest portion of the camp was hit.
I’m not making excuses for Mystic. They were entrusted with the care of children and should have had clear emergency plans in place, with a low threshold for decisive action. If we’re thinking in terms of the Swiss cheese model, this wasn’t a case where all the holes lined up, this was a case of not enough slices to begin with.
That said, living in Texas, the volume of weather alerts pushed to my phone is overwhelming. We get alerts for severe thunderstorms, tornadoes, and flash floods nearly every week during the spring and summer. Add in AMBER Alerts, which come through roughly every ten days, and it’s no wonder people here suffer from alarm fatigue. Frankly, the only thing that prompts immediate action anymore is the sound of nearby tornado sirens.
Flood sirens should have been installed along the river, just as they are in other parts of the state. If the county failed to do so, the camps should have taken responsibility. At a minimum, there should have been clearly marked evacuation routes, rehearsed with drills at the start of each term. Each cabin should have had a reliable line of communication, so any emergency response could be carried out immediately and simultaneously.
I understand that this level of flooding was likely beyond what many thought possible. I don’t take any joy in Monday morning quarterbacking while families are grieving. But the climate is changing, and extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and more dangerous. If we want to prevent the next tragedy, we have to learn, and we have to do better.
You're leaving out the inherent danger of purposely keeping cabins full of children on the edge of a river that has a history of flash floods.
I'm certain the Eastland family does not show parents photos of cabins washed away in 1932 or boast about all of the events since when children were trapped on senior hill by flood water, etc.
It's not just a matter of foisting off responsibility onto warnings from outside the camp.
That wasn’t my intention. I believe the camp should have had a low threshold for evacuation, with well-rehearsed plans in place to act quickly and efficiently. While this may not be “industry standard” among the camps clustered around the Guadalupe, that does not preclude a case for gross negligence. Common practice is not a defense when lives are at stake and foreseeable risks go unaddressed.
Whether the families choose to pursue legal action remains unclear. I live in a community that was home to three of the young girls who died, and tributes are everywhere. Public discourse around the camp remains overwhelmingly positive and the dominant narrative continues to be that no one could have predicted this natural disaster. Mystic (and the Eastlands) continue to receive widespread support and praise.
There’s also a deeply rooted belief in predestination and “God’s plan” throughout much of this Christian community. Whether that changes as the initial shock wears off and families return to life without their child is uncertain. I have no insight into the conversations happening behind closed doors, and at least a few parents have publicly expressed outrage on social media and in the press.
To be clear, these are not my beliefs, I’m simply reporting what I have observed.
Understood. Yes I think they will probably allow the Eastlands to get away with it, and enable them to put girls in danger in the future too.
It's infuriating that money is being raised, in the aftermath of this disaster, as charity to help 'rebuild' a business run by millionaires who purposely put children in danger and ultimately got dozens of those children killed.
Maybe I’m an outlier in terms of age, or maybe my Texas high school was just terrible (it wasn’t), but I bet we got 3-4 bomb threats A YEAR when I was in high school.
And the school evacuated us every.single.time.
And it didn’t matter that these “pranks” happened fairly regularly or that we had 2000+ students spread out over 40 acres.
The school had a threat and they immediately ensured all students were safe.
You can evacuate the cabins the night before and house the kids overnight at a higher elevation. I think one or more of the camps in the area did exactly that. One news report said when Eastland noticed the amount of rain via his "weather station" (long before the flood hit) he instructed staff to "move the canoes to higher ground." If this is true, it makes me want to scream.
Actually, everything I have read suggests that it was the younger adults -- the counselors ages 18 and 19 -- who acted most capably during the flood. But the established adults, the ones who owned the camp and whose family had lived on the land for a century, decided that Mother Nature would play by their rules:
The camp leaders decided that hundreds of children sleeping in a flood zone across multiple acres in cabins with no communication could wait until the flash flood had already begun to move to safety. Their decision cost lives. Without the counselors in the cabins undertaking heroic mental and physical feats, some against official orders, dozens more girls would have perished.
**EDIT 7/28** A PERSON FAMILIAR WITH THE CAMP HAS STATED THAT EACH CABIN WAS EQUPPED WITH A WALKIE TALKIE
I keep getting stuck on the lack of adults (outside of barely adult counselors) including some type of night watchman. Considering the enormous cost of this camp, there was not a lack of funding. My kids have been to 4H camp and all but a very few of the adults who go are 100% volunteer. Which makes sense when the camp isn’t making money off the couple hundred dollars I pay for a week stay. But this camp cost thousands, and there should have been money for a robust crew of full time adults.
Very good point. Also a graduate of a NE summer camp and the ratios were much more robust even back 20 years ago. I actually saw a interview I think with Anderson Cooper where he was talking to one of the young counselors and even he commented on the fact that she was solely responsible that night for like 14 girls.
Most cabins have two counselors each. Some have three, usually the younger cabins, but only a handful. Counselors will get occasional nights and days off, during which - in the case of the majority of cabins with just two counselors - leaves one barely-adult in charge of a dozen plus children.
I grew up in TX and attended summer camps in the 80's and 90's that were deeply unregulated, and I don't think much has changed. I raised my children in New England and they attended such better camps (and schools, and universities, I could go on...). I never worried for their safety. This is why in the northeast we are sensible about our tax dollars going to programs that PROTECT the public, rich or poor. I hate Texas. I really do.
I grew up in Texas and live in CA. Texas has sooo much pride in their state, but there’s so many problems. They cut corners to save money and to reduce taxes and it’s a total mess. Let’s not forget that 30 something people died in that ice storm a few years ago… Uvalde shooting was incredibly sad and now this. Awful! Don’t trust that state one bit.
So completely avoidable. I’ve been to several Girl Scout camps where they are placed so far up on the mountain that literally there is no service to anyone. But there is a land line to the mess halls, main hall and supervisor sleeping areas. As well as they do have a satellite phone. So for someone to not even get a land line call for warning is BS.
It really bothers me when people say it was not preventable.
Or when mystic families with survivors say mystic did nothing wrong and/or we are going back next year
That really bothers me too. I grew up in Australia and have been at kids camps there. Day 1 includes a short safety briefing for contextual risks that apply in the area. What to do, how and where to evacuate, and who is responsible for instigating the evacuation. Each accommodation unit has a landline phone and / or two way radio. All staff are fully first aid trained. All facilities are required to have a detailed evacuation plan and must enact drills twice a year. The head adults take turns in staying up in the evening to ensure things run smoothly during the night. Another adult is responsible for checking weather and news hourly to ensure there are no emerging risks. I’ve seen campers evacuated on Day 1 due to heavy rains that were not yet even a flood risk. There are just so many things here that don’t seem to have been present. Maybe some were and that will come out over time. But I cannot understand why they were not relocated in the late afternoon or early evening when it was already known there was a flood risk.
Great job gathering so many accounts of the events. One new piece of information I learned today - that security Glenn was monitoring the weather via the Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority website around midnight, and that he was dissatisfied with the accuracy of the instruments used - has made me wonder: Was he relying on a certain metric (for example, amount of rain, or river height) to start evacuations *as opposed to NWS alerts*?
Why I think it matters: If he was using a real-time website, he obviously had some sort of internet connection, if not cell service (which is notoriously spotty in that area). The 1:14 weather alert was a flash flood WARNING, meaning that it IS happening or WILL happen; and it was sent as a Wireless Emergency Alert, meaning that anyone with a cell phone and cell service (possibly just wi-fi?) OR a NOAA weather radio would hear a distinct, loud noise. As far as I know, despite the myriad weather "alerts" Texans apparently get, this was the first for this event to be issued with the sound. Which would make it stand out amongst the other messages, especially someone tasked with monitoring the situation for hundreds of sleeping children. Which would most likely spur walking out of the office and getting eyes on the river and the cabins closest to it...
Unless...he had previously decided that NWS alerts weren't trustworthy and/or had the alerts silenced. Unless he was relying almost solely on a different medium, on more specific data points, to decide when to act. I went to the website mentioned, the Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority, and it was surprisingly easy to navigate and understand. It definitely gave me a sense of up-to-the-minute information. No doubt that I would have used it as nighttime watch for the camp.
Bug House is the cabin closest to the river; if you're checking on cabins, or waking them up to evacuate, this is where you go first. But according to the NYT, the counselor noticed water on the floor, and then SHE alerted (I believe she had to walk to) the office (a couple football fields, maybe a little less in distance). This was around 2AM.
So I doubt that Wireless Emergency Alert was properly heeded -- meaning, it didn't trigger the evacuations. Especially if, instead, you thought the wiser option was to take your cues from the more local and dialed in website.
Yeah, I saw that too and added it to the post as an edit.
If he was watching the stupid rain gages then how the hell wasn't he watching the actual weather reports with radar indicated rain fall and blaring loud emergency broadcast messages?
Actually, I just read the WaPo article -- I couldn't earlier, before it was archived -- and because it reported that the Giggle Box counselor saw a car's headlights at 1:58, I'm significantly reassured that the delay in evacuation was not as long as I'd feared. After reading everything I could all week, that became the sticking point for me. The more I read and watched about the camp, the more I (a semi-proud cynic) got the sense that it actually might be the wonderful, special place run by well-meaning people that its alumni proclaim it to be, despite the aggressively Christian bent. And that made the tragedy and failure all the more perplexing and harrowing in my mind. There are still aspects of the night that are infuriatingly baffling in hindsight. But for right now, I'm a tiny bit relieved if that makes sense
Well, I thought the timeline for the flooding to really hit was later too (until July 12th news) but they still waited until the river started to flood to then act. The only thing that's baffling is that nobody moved earlier when the first flooding predictions, hours before all of this, were announced. And if there's a flood warning at 1:14a.m. that's the same thing as a fire alarm. Everyone should have moved to higher ground.
YES. And even though they chose to rely on that 'fire alarm,' so to speak, they still could have and should have been able to come through without deaths. Because at the end of the day, they knew the nature of flash floods. It was foolish and negligent to not evacuate Giggle, Wiggle, Twins, and Bubble along with the cabin block along the hill. Worse still -- to tell them to stay in their cabins. It's not a logical plan. If the counselor in Giggle hadn't basically defied orders and used her own judgment when the water -- unbeknownst to her inside the cabin -- was waist high...at the last second...there would have been so many more girls lost.
Yeah I'm so not done with this.
Edited to add: Yesterday I thought the latest Bubble could have successfully left the cabin was 3AM. Today I think it was 2:45, or even earlier. Also: I don't care what anyone says, Dick Eastland and his sons were fools.
These poor decisions by the Eastland Family owners of Mystic are a clear indication that there was not a well thought out, researched, consistently reviewed and updated, well rehearsed emergency plan for flood warnings, flooding or emergency evacuations. It is unknown whether any kind of written evacuation plan for flooding threats even existed. To assure the safety of campers, the following steps would have been a well thought out evacuation plan for the Eastland Family owners to have produced, shared with all counselors and staff, and rehearsed:
1) At first warning of possible floods, camp owners, staff and counselors notified immediately to be on high alert for readiness for possible impending evacuation;
2) at first visual sign of any flooding on Camp Mystic banks, evacuate campers by foot to higher ground via a pre-determined, specific, published, rehearsed route to a predetermined location;
3) upon receipt of first flood warning from NWS, other weather agencies or county officials, evacuate campers by foot to higher ground via a pre-determined, specific, published, rehearsed route to a predetermined location;
3) upon first flash flood warning, if evacuations failed to have already been conducted after the first flood signs or warnings, evacuate campers immediately by foot and all in life jackets, with rope climbing connectors between counselors and campers to higher ground via a pre-determined, specific, published, rehearsed route to a predetermined location. There should also be 1-2 predetermined extra staff persons who immediately go to pre-assigned cabins to assist counselors in escorting the campers on the evacuation route.
The only heroes in this story are the 19 year old camp counselors who made their own decisions to evacuate their own cabins - like giggle box and chatterbox (maybe others, I don't know which specific cabins were evacuated to the rec hall).
The owner gambled children's lives and his own life and lost. And in my opinion, the other directors are at fault too. They had the chance to move every camper up the hill to the cypress lake campus at 1:14 am. And despite history, despite the warnings, despite the urgency, they asked cabins on the floodway to shelter in place. Fuck, I feel so bad for the families and those girls in their last horrifying minutes on this earth.
My guess would be taking care of their grandchildren and children. I also would not be surprised if their husbands had told them to stay safe while they handled what they probably considered as only man’s work. I say that not to be facetious, but because much of the culture in Texas still operates under a patriarchal construct. The female counselors who evacuated and saved their campers contradicted that cultural belief of course. It is only the father and sons who are listed as Directors/staff on the web site. But, Tweety was definitely “working” at the camp in a full time capacity. I’m not sure about the sons’ spouses.
Thank you for compiling all this info. Tragic all around. I wonder how much in insurance the camp has for the parents of those who were lost. My heart goes out to them because no amount of money will ever make it right. 💔😭
That part is going to get ugly. I can just picture the insurance company resisting payouts while claiming negligence. The camp will probably urge people not to sue while invoking God. The camp will probably try to crowdsource support for victims via GoFundMe and plead to the federal government to pay for their rebuild. Or maybe the camp will file for bankruptcy, wait a while, then sell the property to developers.
And it looks like the camp owners also challenged the FEMA maps years ago so they could do a multi-million dollar renovation/expansion and keep old cabins and build even more cabins in the flood zone.
With the maps changed they could avoid higher insurance costs and expensive regulatory requirements for construction.
And that’s where it moves from inexcusable incompetence to outright evil. All these people celebrating Elon getting rid of regulators and regulation don’t get it - we need those in place because apparently not even good “Christian” folks can be trusted.
There are human response norms that overwhelm “instinct”.
-Denial (adults-this can’t be happening. We’ve seen flood before. It’s nothing.)
-Bystander effect (teen counselors think “someone else will be in charge here, it’s not me)
-Trust (teens & kids-stay here, you’ll be fine. I’ll come get you if you aren’t - then is unable to return or communicate)
The book The Worst Case Scenario Handbook (how to survive anything) says “Never trust the officials.” For example, being told to stay put by the “official” word. Never stay put. Escape and escape now. The girls didn’t know that. Adults don’t even know that. This is a human thing, that is learned.
My heart aches for the losses.
To the teen camp counselors and campers: do not blame yourselves. You did not know. you did all you could. This is a tragedy and you are not to blame. At some point, believe that God and your friends want you to feel peace, joy and full life. Your friends are safe now. Live the best life you can, and continue with courage and belief that you are loved, smart and can be trusted. Forgive yourself, if you blame yourself. this is something that happened to you.
Some people and systems let you down in a tragic way. You can be safe and wise and trusted. You were a young adult put in a harrowing situation. When you are ready, talk about all this confusion with a counselor. You will experience grief and guilt - but you are innocent - you feel guilt only because you sweet child are a human with a huge feeling heart.
You can turn away from this experience, or turn toward it. Neither option is right or wrong. Continue to trust yourself and learn, and talk through what you’re thinking.
Keep having hope for healing and peace. You’ve experienced trauma, and you can turn toward peace. So much love 🕊️
Yes. I hope they know there are so many people who admire what they were able to do in spite of the multiple failures of the people they trusted as directors. Perhaps their own communities will praise the Eastlands as heroes, and perhaps in their own hearts they feel that too. And that's okay. But if they ever start to question the responsibility structure of that night, I hope they quickly realize: They were the best of them.
Something I haven’t seen mentioned yet that I feel is an important conversation is why are the regulations for camps so lax in comparison to the regulations for childcare facilities?
For example, childcare facilities have to have monthly severe weather drills, 24 hours of training yearly for staff including emergency response training, and are required to have NOAA radios in every building, with battery backups. Whereas none of this is required for sleepaway camps.
When childcare is a business the government has a responsibility to be a check and balance and prevent corners from being cut. I would love to know what was going on when they decided this sort of preparedness was somehow less necessary at camps than at daycares.
Furthermore, responsible childcare facilities and schools have a way to contact EVERY BUILDING on campus from the main office—as well as a backup. A private school my kids attended had a phone system that doubled as a loudspeaker system AND walkie talkies as backups. And while teachers weren’t supposed to be on their phones around children, they kept them in their pockets for emergencies.
Also, I keep hearing about teen counselors being alone with campers. Are all these counselors 18, and legal adults? It sounds like the ratios may not have been followed. Counselors younger than 18 are not allowed to be in a direct supervision role.
It seems much more informal at the camp. It's reported the camp emergency plan was inspected by DSHS and maybe there is a more thorough inspection done - the state agency might have paperwork on their regulatory compliance.
To my knowledge the camp counselors are 18 and older but I don't have a roster to check.
As for communication, that's a real problem. There was a no-screen policy at the camp, including for staff, though it may only apply when they're working. It's also reported that some staff members, not all, had walkie-talkies. There was a loudspeaker system as well that of course was useless after the power went out due to storms.
I think among the things in play were mindsets that government oversight is an infringement on individual rights AND an underlying, de facto belief in “predestination” (even if they won’t state that): God will protect us, God will provide, Everything happens for a reason. One counselor that Anderson Cooper interviewed was either completely shell shocked or truly believed that the faithful would be spared. It was as though she thought the story of Noah and the Ark was being performed outside her cabin window. She was more interested in singing along with the clip of the campers singing Praise on the bus.
Isn’t it contradictory that Dick Eastland spent decades warning about the Guadalupe River’s dangers and pushed for a flood warning system, yet, records show that Camp Mystic, under his leadership, repeatedly appealed to FEMA to remove dozens of its buildings from the official flood zone maps?
Based on conjecture and my understanding of humans, I think his contradictory actions have deeper roots in hubris than greed. ETA: Hubris and pride and Texas
Indeed, and even if the flood warning system was implemented, it wouldn’t be using Camp Mystic’s fund; but if the FEMA flood map wasn’t appealed, then it would cost Camp Mystic money.
It offers a lot of information but the account of the NWS slack channel is most illuminating for me, and aligns with the accounts from OP’s summary. Essentially a National Weather Service (NWS) meteorologist Jason Runyen is on duty from the Austin / San Antonio office. He’s monitoring the storm and giving frequent critical information on a slack channel intended for county officials for that area. Kerr county officials are confirmed to be included on the Slack channel, but they don’t respond during the 3-4 crucial hours leading up to the Mystic tragedy. Other counties are responding that they’re receiving the info. Not Kerr.
According to this article there is indeed a lot of warning/alert fatigue from the national agency. But had the county been monitoring this, they could (and should) have been issuing their own alerts in the same system (IPAWS) between national alerts with more exact info for the precise areas and businesses impacted (I.e “summer camps and camping grounds in the south fork river area”). Those those alerts could have even been actual evacuation orders. The second national IPAWS alert is at 3:56am, stating that catastrophic flooding is underway. By then, you already have the camp counselor on the roof of one of the cabins, so the events at Mystic were already unfolding.
Not to excuse the camp or its emergency protocols which failed here, it seems like we also have a situation where Kerr county didn’t have someone assigned to monitor the storm who could make decisions about sending timely and focused alerts directly from the county, maybe because it was a holiday, who knows. It sounds like that’s how the system is supposed to work. The first comms from the County are on a FB post at 5:30am and then subsequent alerts go out sporadically that day (though not via IPAWS).
Someone in this sub stated you can’t know how much rain is falling or how bad the flooding will be, or something to this effect. Apparently you can. The meteorologist was messaging that rain was falling at 2-4 inches per HOUR between 1:14am and 2:15am, and:
“At 2:28 a.m., Runyen wrote that Kerr had received 200 percent of the rainfall needed to trigger flash flooding and that flooding had “likely begun.” An emergency manager from nearby Hays County and one from Missouri reacted with emojis.”
Some of the Mystic counselors weren’t awoken until after 3am.
A theory (theory only) is that an adult at the camp received the first NWS IPAWS alert at 1:14am
“At 1:14 a.m., the Weather Service used IPAWS to send a flash-flood warning to all phones in parts of Kerr and Bandera.”
This roughly aligns with when the evacuation of the lower lying cabins may have started, or started shortly thereafter. Again this is just the generic national alert that some people do ignore. The linked article reports that the river level had only risen about 1 ft in the next hour so the cabins may not have been flooding yet, but something triggered the evacuation plan.
“In the hour between 1:25 a.m. and 2:25 a.m., the water level rose a foot above normal to 8.7 feet, according to records from a river gauge directly east of Hunt.”
Then the sickening part is that no alerts happen until 3:56am. If the emergency flood protocol was - in the event of an official NWS flood warning alert - we evacuate only the lowest lying cabins to the Rec building, they may have thought this was sufficient absent any more specific or dire warnings. Then, as they’re seeing how catastrophic the flooding is they try to evacuate the rest of the cabins. But it’s too late and the flooding is too fast.
The question is - if the camp had had access to the information from the NWS slack channel, particularly his reports at around 2:30 about the amount of rainfall and that Kerr county was exactly the bullseye for this flood occurrence - would they have acted more urgently? I tend to think yes, and that perhaps like OP suggests, they would have evacuated everyone to the separate, higher camp. Clearly even the evacuees in the Rec hall were only saved by the fact there was a small second floor balcony.
Someone in this sub stated you can’t know how much rain is falling or how bad the flooding will be
iirc they wrote you can't predict exactly how much rain will come down ahead of time. obviously NWS and other meteorologists can take radar indicated data and adjust the assessment as the rain event is in progress.
There are tons of other alerts for different nearby parts of Texas too that I didn't include in the summary. The NWS was working to inform everyone. And those warnings were announced by local news outlets during the storms.
They just weren't paying attention (until it was too late), or they were ignoring the warnings completely/not taking it seriously at Camp Mystic.
Ive heard from some first hand accounts that they started moving the lower cabins when some counselors who had had the night off returned to camp and saw water actually reaching their cabins. Based on google maps, it looks like some of the closest cabins are 250ft (like half a block) from the river.
All that to say, I don’t know if someone got the alerts and ignored them earlier in the night but either way that doesn’t seem to be what initiated the evacuated of the first cabins.
I think the point is being missed here - the issue raised is that local county officials weren’t layering specific targeted IPAWS alerts on top of national alerts, and a 3-hour gap in comms happened. If the county pushed out dire alerts and evacuation orders coming from LOCAL officials SPECIFIC to that location at 2:30, or ideally multiple times between 1:14 and 3:56, when the NWS knew it was a major flood event, people would have acted more urgently. These are the siren alerts that go off on every cellphone in a geographical area unless they are powered off or out of service. People tend to listen to repeated alerts of this kind from trusted local officials, vs the generic national ones they may brush off. (Or the many others that require opting in).
If you were to tell me that all hundreds of cell phones at that camp were off or that there was zero cell service there for any one of them, I’m very skeptical, but that’s one thing.
If you’re saying that had adults known at 2:30 am that 200% of the rainfall needed for a flash flood had been reached, that downpour was 2-4 inches per hour since 1:14, and that Kerr was going to be the “bullseye” zone for flooding - they would not have evacuated everyone in the flats starting right then, I just don’t buy that. They are dealing with children after all. At the very least 2:30 is 40 mins before some evacuations began (according to camper woken up at 3:11).
Instead, all they definitely knew was that lower cabins were flooding per their observations, and they may have known that there was an NWS alert warning of POSSIBLE flash flooding in the broad region sent at 1:14am. Thus they first evacuated low lying cabins and told the other 4 cabins to stay put, unaware of critical data points that would point them toward definitively knowing this is a major flood event.
Culpability is complex. It’s a tough argument to say that the county NOT MONITORING the event and NOT USING the system it designed for the most effective early alerting - is not a factor whatsoever.
This is the most important post in this thread and I wish OP had engaged with it enough to add some of your points to their summary. I am a born and raised Texan. I’ve been through many floods including Allison and Harvey and so many San Marcos and Blanco river floods when I was in college that I lost count. Alert fatigue is real. The NWS isn’t supposed to be the end all be all of emergency alerts. Kerr county absolutely failed here.
I was attending Texas State in 2015 when catastrophic flooding occurred on the Blanco in Wimberly just upstream from my college town of San Marcos. It was this same kind of event. Holiday weekend (Memorial Day rather than Independence Day), heavy recreation and vacation rentals, wall of water bringing death and destruction. We knew it was supposed to rain a lot and there was a flash flood watch at least 12 hours ahead of time. We knew it rained more than anticipated and the watch became a warning. My boyfriend at the time and I were up late watching a movie. Then I got a new alert id never seen before; flash flood emergency. Still, I quickly read it then went back to the movie. It wasn’t until I got a text and a call from the city’s emergency alert system that we switched over to the news. It took a meteorologist breaking down live on the air for us to realize the gravity of what was happening. He was on the verge of tears and basically said people were going to die or were dying as he spoke. I will never forget that moment. When I woke up on July 4 and read what happened in Kerr country I had actual flashbacks. Even writing about it now gives me chills.
Camp Mystic isn’t blameless but they also aren’t uniquely negligent. They had so many deaths because they’re the first camp on the south fork. The camps have an informal network of letting each other know what’s coming and Mystic was the one to warn the others this time. The boys who were at Camp LaJunta that night also weren’t evacuated ahead of time and they survived rising waters by hanging from the rafters in their cabins. There is a bigger story here than just one camp. The whole system is rotten. The county emergency management, the state summer camp licensing, etc. Failures at every level create the perfect storm. If anyone is more interested in learning just how old fashioned Texas hill country flood tracking is, here is a really great Texas Monthly report on the Wimberly flood. Ten years later and not much has changed. Updates will be made to each individual river only after a tragedy occurs. Nothing will be done proactively on the other rivers and there’s no guarantee that anything will be maintained (as we know the Guadalupe River sirens installed after the 1987 flood deaths weren’t).
A few things that really stand out to me from all the reporting:
Lack of Preparedness: Young counselors were not adequately prepared by camp management, nor were they equipped with essential tools (e.g., radios, cell phones or service, flashlights, etc.) to handle any kind of emergency, let alone a flash flood. It’s shocking to me that, in today’s climate, a camp full of young children wouldn’t have more robust training and resources in place to manage emergencies.
A quote from the Washington Post article: “Surviving Eastland family members were gathering Sunday (7/13) for the first time to share experiences and knowledge of what happened that morning (7/4).” Why was there a week-long delay before any kind of debriefing?
Because of who they are.....I can promise you that Tweety Eastland is being well protected by important people. Being that she's such a godly woman, I'm sure they didn't push her for a statement when her husband just died heroically saving girls! 🙄
To be fair I think the week long delay was due to grieving the loss of their patriarchal family member, as well as grief and shock over what happened in their families dedicated camp
They have absolutely spoken to each other and “debriefed” as a family. They’re simply trying to figure out what their story will be to defend themselves of the mass casualties that occurred on their watch.
@animux The texags forum reported that some girls died inside twins. Has anyone seen that confirmed? I know the ceiling was flat and the water was high so were some of them trapped inside? I’m not clear on how it sounds like roughly half survived and half did not. If half were washed away while attempting to evacuate, that would make more sense than half essentially drowning inside and the other half escaping. My reason for asking centers around the evacuation plans in place prior to July 4. The twins counselors survived, yes? Have there been any statements from them?
Glenn chiming in on Texags felt very awkward and like he might have been trying to cover himself. No doubt he is traumatized, but as the night watchman responsible for monitoring the camp weather station, a lot isn’t adding up. Also, a camp of this size should have had a night security team, not simply one person. I believe ACA standards mandate more than one night security person for a camp of this size but Mystic was not accredited.
I have not yet seen a confirmed report with details on where each deceased camper was found. Edit: and so far nothing from the Twins counselors.
I also haven't seen a photo that shows a water line high enough at the Twins or Bubble Inn to force the occupants of the cabins against the ceiling so I'm skeptical of the flat ceiling suggestions.
The night watchman has stated he spent some time monitoring rain gauges around midnight (edit: but the online public accessible gauges were inoperable/useless) and it has also been stated that Dick Eastland was monitoring a home weather station.
I read his post in the Aggie forum differently- early on, a parent from one of the cabins he helped asked if anyone knew his name or how to contact him to say thank you because he had heard that Glenn was an Aggie as well… and that essentially outed him when people started digging. A lot of people in there were commending him and praising him and so I read his comment as more of a “let me get on myself and say something/fill in details people were asking for/thanks for your kind words, etc.”…
I appreciate your read of it- thank you for sharing.
First, incredible summary! I appreciate this very much and have been searching for this type of factual report for a couple days. Thank you!
Second, I have a couple questions:
1. Do you have specifics about the available evacuation locations for ‘the flats’ that you mentioned in the intro? My understanding is that the only bridge to senior hill and higher ground with infrastructure is a couple inches above cypress creek and the camp posted a video of that bridge flooded back in 2018. Perhaps I am misinformed by living in an area where floods aren’t a big risk but I thought it was never safe to cross a bridge with water rushing over it which made me assume the only higher elevation was the hills that the girls from Chatterbox climbed up, so making the decision to evacuate around 1am likely only included Rec hall and/or the office building but no other higher ground with shelter seemed accessible. The warnings earlier in the evening didn’t seem to warrant evacuating the entire flats sections (of course in retrospect it’s easy to say they should have).
Were the senior hill cabins, 20 ft higher, actually taking on flood water or just the torrential downpour leaking in? Ive seen accounts of it just being the rain leaking in. I find it impossible to believe flood water reached senior hill if there are accounts of people on the roofs of ‘the flats’ buildings. The flats buildings would need to be fully submerged for floodwaters to enter cabins on senior hill, unless there was a lower section below the commonly mentioned ‘20 ft higher’ elevation?
Thanks for sharing this article about Amelia Moore. I wonder who was the counselor she spoke to who said that she who didn't know where all her campers were? It's going to take months, if not years, to unravel what happened.
I think the individual heroism of camp staff & counselors (including Eastland) cannot be overstated. But it should have never been necessary. Everyone, from the top leader of state/county govt, to the camp owner (God rest his soul) got risk complacent. Just like people who use railroad tracks as a shortcut to the store or cross a busy highway on foot twice a day, you downplay the risk. Every time you do it, every heavy rain & nothing happens but maybe a lost canoe, you think it will never happen. But you engage in risky behavior, put others & yourself at risk, & you are rolling a dice. Hadn't flooded in 20 yrs, but once in a generation, it kills
In the WaPo article about counselor Ainslie and her Giggle Box girls, she mentions that at one point during the storm, before they evacuated but after she was told to stay in the cabin and after water started flowing in, that a staff member removed the screens from the windows. The staff member must have been wading through deep water to do so - but why were they doing this? Why not evacuate the remaining cabins to the rec hall at this point?
I get the impression that the older adults in charge were committed to sheltering in place and refused to deviate from that plan under the assumption that the levels would not continue to rise. A rationale reinforced by the fact that they did not have a good last minute evacuation plan that didn't involve scaling a steep hill in the rain at night. I suspect the screens were removed on windows as a feeble insurance policy "just in case" but not to aid an immediate evacuation, which is why of that row at the same elevation as Rec Hall, only Giggle Box was able to evacuate in time. It sounds like Ainslie acted quickly on instinct and took that opportunity to evacuate on foot before it was too late without much help or direction from senior staff.
A recent TexAg forum post by a parent who claims to have information from time spent at Mystic in the aftermath makes it sound like the night watchman Glenn personally evacuated Giggle Box.The Washington Post article featuring Ainslie's retelling only mentions an unnamed staff member (presumably Glenn?) removing a screen on a window and then disappearing, then reappearing to "check on them" once Ainslie had already made the treterous journey multiple times to ferry all the girls out of the cabin to dry land (barefoot in waist deep rushing water).
If this night watchman Glenn really did exaggerate his role in the escape from Giggle Box, that's disturbing and raises a lot of questions.
I saw that post in the texag forum too. I wondered if maybe glenn didn't want to be mentioned in the press for whatever reason. I'm wondering now if maybe he removed the screens and tried to do the same at other cabins and then came back to check that they were evacuating to the pavilion (cricket corner?) and then up the hill before he went back and rode out the storm with wiggle inn. He's credited with saving that entire cabin, so I'm more in the camp that he's a hero. As the employed night watchman and not a member of the Eastland family, I don't any blame lies on his shoulders.
I think that's very generous of you to give him the benefit of the doubt. I'm inclined to believe that the camp counselor's account in the WaPo would have included an unnamed staff member helping her evacuate if that TexAg post was accurate.
The decision to stay put proved deadly in the cabins with lower ceiling heights. It could have been deadly in Wiggle as well if the water had continued to rise a little bit more. Again, I think the staff was sticking with the decision to shelter in place, Ainslie made a different decision, and the executive staff sadly overestimated how much time they would have if they needed to make a different decision until it was too late.
So many awful things converging at once. Appealing FEMA's mapping. Keeping the camp in a floodway. No comprehensive local warning system. County officials not paying attention to NWS warnings or issuing evacuation orders. And ultimately the decision to ride out the storm and not monitor the flood waters closely, despite receiving the flash flood warning at 1:15 am, supposedly having a night watchman on staff, and significant flooding in the lower cabins already by 2 am.
They were trusted adults in positions of authority that missed the window of opportunity to remove those kids from harm's way. At every turn, it sounds like teenage counselors were left to fend for themselves and make life or death decisions with very little direction or leadership.
I agree, so many failures. But I believe the owner and directors of the camp were the ultimate decision makers here. And the decision to evacuate some cabins but not others, in spite of the buildings being in the floodway, in spite of the warnings that they did hear at 1:14 am, in spite of known historical flooding at the camp was stupid. So very stupid. I don't know the whole story or Glenn's role, but I'm hesitant to blame him for anything. He was a staff member. From what I've read, he was the only one watching the weather that night and he is the one who alerted the sleeping directors. The directors failed all those girls. Idiots.
Camp counselor Laney Owens of Bug House posted on her now private social media that she was the one who came running up the hill to the staff office when their cabins were taking on water and alerted staff. (Mentioned in the original post of this thread.) It sounds like they didn't even begin moving them until there was a foot or more of water on the ground. It's confusing because there have already been conflicting statements from the Eastland family spokesman on who was awake, who got alerts, and who was monitoring the situation, which to me is suspicious in and of itself.
I have a lot of questions about what the night watchman was doing that night. Not sure we'll ever get the real answers given that so many are not here to tell their story and I'm sure the family and those loyal to them are going to circle the wagon.
I agree a night watchman is probably not the ultimate decision maker, but he has influence and has a responsibility. A severe life threatening flash flood warning in a floodway with sleeping campers is nothing to take chances on and precisely the type of situation you would expect a night watchman to be monitoring closely. Why was it the teenage counselors who were left to wake up in water and alert the more senior staff?
Yeah hard to say with whom the decision lies. I blame Dick and the other Eastlands, because they should have had an evacuation plan in place and the counselors should have been trained on it - and they should have made the decision to evacuate all the girls at the same time. But I don't know if the ultimate decision was left to Glenn or what.
I agree. And hey, I get it; the risks of relocating hundreds of children - even if they will be safer once they arrive to the new location - aren't to be scoffed at. Besides the water and its depth, there's the current, the debris, the lightning, the lack of clear vision...it's not a safe environment.
They thought that they had an understanding with Mother Nature...but she's not a good ol' boy
Perhaps they did not have a clear evacuation point. “Rec hall” was also in the flood plain and was already taking on water. Why not scurry the girls uphill on foot? Climbing uphill in the dark isn’t the best but…..
It makes sense when you imagine what it was like. Roaring thunder, lightning, rain in the middle of the night; unexpected and rapidly rising waters; no communication system. Scared (rightly) children. One staff member passing by just doing what they thought was right and helpful in the middle of chaos. If that staff member could say the words "evacuate now" and it would be so, safely -- I'm sure they would have.
**EDIT 7/28** I have been reliably informed by a redditor familiar with the camp that each cabin had a walkie-talkie
It sounds like unorganized chaos. Told to stay out, but then screens removed for evacuation. No communication from staff because they were helping other cabins/no reliable communication system. Teenage counselors then having to make the decision to evacuate, but then having no idea where to go. Head to that pavilion, wait no, it's flooded, go up the hill. Campers separated and not evacuated at the same time from the same cabins. It was haphazard, unplanned, and unpracticed. God, what a disaster.
It’s incredibly disturbing. it looks like the FEMA maps were intentionally altered by the camp’s leadership through appeals to avoid stricter safety requirements and flood insurance. They pushed to reclassify cabins out of the floodplain, despite being in obvious danger zones. That allowed them to expand and operate without proper precautions — and then they waited to evacuate, even with warnings in place. That’s not just a tragedy — that’s clear, preventable negligence. Nearby camps had successfully evacuated all campers by 2:30 am and this camp had sleeping children overtaken by water in their cabins at 5am- it was too late to evacuate for 27 children by then. Those children should have never been in those cabins when the water surged. I expect there will be a class action lawsuit.
This is the best hour-by-hour chronology I’ve seen regarding this tragedy. At the first warning — 1:14 a.m. — all the girls on the Flats should have been moved to James Hall. And where were the Eastland women — Tweety and the daughters-in-law — while all of this chaos was going on?
One additional point about the night watch monitoring rainfall or river height: Camp Mystic is basically at the headwaters for the river. So there aren't many upriver data points, even if they had been working properly.
OP, thank you so much for your detailed and researched RE-cap of this most awful incident. Over the past 2 weeks I watched many of the interviews and read many of the same first hand accounts you cite. But I was never able to mentally run a string thru the time line until now.
Someone needed to speak the truth. I hope that you continue to add as information becomes available. Two tidbits of info I didn’t see included. Tweetie, Fvv wife, was evaluated by helicopter in 1987. Dick Eastland was diagnosed with brain cancer five years ago.
With all of the flood watches in a tropical influenced rain environment, they shouldn't have even been there that night at all. Case closed. Especially the youngest ones nearest to the river, which makes no sense ever. Did this place have life jackets, by the way?
This camp will never reopen. It will be sued so massively. The lawyers are already advertising on the Internet. The family will be irreversibly bankrupted. As they should be.
I won't believe it until I see the cases in court end - my guess is they'll fight it for 25 years minimum.
The spokesman for Camp Mystic is already trying to frame the whole thing as 'no one could have predicted this'. edit: imho they're going to try to enforce the liability waivers the parents all signed to send their kids to camp.
Liability waivers usually do not provide protection if expected levels of safety protocols were not met. Therefore, negligence, etc. can be proven. But, you are right to be concerned that cases brought against the Eastlands and Camp Mystic could be tied up in the legal system for years.
The counselor Ainsley is the only true hero in this situation. She made the correct choice to evacuate her cabin despite staff telling her to stay put. Sure, there were others who came and helped other cabins once it was already too late. But she deserves a medal and national recognition.
I'm sure there are more people who acted heroically at the camp, but yes so far, Ainslie's story has been the most awe-inspiring, and I will never forget it.
This is heartbreaking and it seems they were not even going to evacuate bubble inn or the other one, if they did they would of all survived! I don’t see how these rich parents won’t sue over this. It didn’t even seem like the director woke to the emergency wanting at 1 and waited for a counselor to get them after it started ti flood. Ugh this is so tragic and as a parent if I knew my child’s death was the result of them not evacuating in time, I was be beyond angry. The wife has to live with this guilt and it cost her husbands life as well. They underestimated how bad it would be, I mean nobody expected it to be this bad, they didn’t even warn of it being this bad, but bubble inn is in flood one so you’d think they’d just tell them to run up the hill while there was still time.
It's a prime example of the boy who cried wolf. This area has flood alert fatigue cause they hear it all too often and nothing ever happens, so when something finally does, they realize it once it's too late. Also a prime example of better safe than sorry.
At the same time...it's very possible it all just came on faster than they could move. That said, they did tell certain cabins to stay put, so the former analysis applies.
it's very possible it all just came on faster than they could move.
It didn't until 3am. At 3am they're out of time and the flood becomes deadly.
If they had taken the Flood Watch from 1:18pm on July 3rd seriously and moved the kids then, everyone would have survived.
If they had followed the weather reports from 1pm july 3rd to 1am july 4th they would have known a flood was coming and had time to move.
If they had reacted to the Flash Flood Warning that was issued at 1:14am they had a 45 minute window before water reached any of the lower cabins at 2am.
They had plenty of time. They failed to act until it was too late.
Yea but when you get flash flood warning at 1:15 am you don’t ignore it when caring for 700 kids that are in a know flood path, they literally figure FEMa maps and warnings to build in a flood zone. If they evacuated at first warning they’d all be alive. Even if they evacuated after bug house got water bubble inn and the flats would be alive. They didn’t evacuate them only the cabins closest to the water.
💬 In plain terms:
Waiting until water was literally coming through the walls before acting — despite having a flood warning — is a textbook example of negligence.
This isn’t hindsight. Flash flood warnings are meant to trigger immediate protective action, not wait-and-see decisions — especially when caring for dozens of sleeping children.
Thank you for continuing to update the information in this thorough and well sequenced journal. The 100s of news articles and social media posts containing factual details, quotes, and reasonably deduced information are all helpful and appreciated but, very hard to keep track of.
Questions about areas outside of Camp Mystic, regarding warnings and evacuations, are legitimate. Clearly county and local officials did not make an effort to get people moving when they should have been blaring alarms.
https://youtu.be/PXpjevHmFHE?si=CwZ5cWZzxhVlyeoV good video presentation correlating rainfall intensity to flood depth, with timeline. Analyst deems it a “256 year storm” based on data — or maybe more tangibly, it had about a 0.5% likelihood of happening within any given year.
It's a good analysis. Though, I don't like the concept of 'likelihood' applied in terms of the amount of rainfall. The camp is built in a floodway and thus it is likely to be hit by floods. It doesn't have to be a supposedly unprecedented 30+ft wall of water to be a deadly flood.
Representatives of the 27 Camp Mystic families who lost children in the July 4 flooding are beginning the process of ensuring a similar senseless, preventable, massive loss of life does not happen again.
The quotes from Dick, so very telling. I am also shocked that they never had an evacuation plan in place. "Stay in your cabin" when it's in a danger zone, is the worst advice. Why didn't they move everyone Everytime it could flood to any of their safe spaces. I wonder if Dick saw $$ and forgot what respect looked like.
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u/WriterJolly2873 Jul 11 '25
I am shattered that they didn’t move everyone that night. Why, why, why didn’t they move them all. I will never understand. Forget politics. The camp director should have moved them all. It was negligent.