The Children the River Took – Over 100 Dead After Texas Flood Disaster, Including 27 From a Summer Camp

It is a catastrophe of biblical proportions - and a moment in which the entire country holds its breath: After the devastating floods in Texas, the number of deaths has risen to at least 104. People are still missing. Rescuers are still digging through the rubble. And the wound carved by the water is still raw. Kerr County was hit especially hard - a hilly idyll west of San Antonio, where summer camps, church retreats, and family festivals take place every year. This is also where "Camp Mystic" is located, a long-established girls’ camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River. What was once a place of carefree joy is now a field of pain and wreckage: 27 of the bodies recovered so far are from this camp - girls who came to dance, to sing, to make friends. Now they are gone. A total of 84 deaths have been confirmed in Kerr County alone, including 28 children. Ten other campers and one counselor are still missing. Senator Ted Cruz called it "every parent’s nightmare" - a phrase that feels like an understatement in the face of what rescuers, residents, and families are witnessing: shattered tents, uprooted trees, lost clothes in the mud, a symbol of government failure. For although the National Weather Service had issued multiple "flash flood" warnings during the night leading into Friday, there appears to have been no widespread alert on the ground. Emergency sirens remained silent. Parents only learned through social media that something terrible had happened. While rainfall fell that would normally take a whole month to accumulate, the evening program was still running at Camp Mystic. Then the water came - fast, brutal, unstoppable. The cleanup and recovery operations are a massive effort, the likes of which Texas has not seen in years. Helpers have come from across the country, even from Mexico: Jesús Gomez, a firefighter from the border town of Acuña, spoke of a “search with bare hands.” Rescue teams from Florida and Louisiana have also been flown in. The ground is soaked, many roads are impassable, and the threat of further flooding remains - because more rain is forecast for Monday. Governor Greg Abbott said on Sunday that 41 people are still considered missing - a number that could change at any moment. Camp Mystic stated that they are mourning "the irreplaceable lives of our girls and counselors" - words that hardly capture the depth of the loss.

And the White House? So far, it remains silent. There are rumors that President Donald Trump may travel to Texas this coming Friday - a first, as never before in American history has a sitting president shown up so late after a natural disaster that claimed over a hundred lives, including so many children. While other presidents stood alongside survivors, Trump seems to remain in Mar-a-Lago - far from the mud, the tears, the questions. What remains are rubber boots in the sludge. Camps shut down, where things will never be the same again. And a society that must ask itself how many warning signs can be ignored before a state is held accountable. The Guadalupe River flows on - but for many, it will never again be a peaceful place.