Central Texas Flash Floods: Camps Mystic, Heart O’ the Hills

Folks living in central Texas are not having a good time. A heavy storm’s rain overloaded waterways before sunrise Friday morning.

Some folks enjoying an Independence Day weekend in that region’s picture-postcard landscapes survived. Others didn’t.

Folks who have been helping sort out the mess have been finding some survivors, and many non-survivors. I’ve started seeing specifics about that: names, circumstances, facts that won’t come close to fully describing the people we lost.

• “Young campers, teachers and football coach among Texas flood victims”
  Rachel Hagan, James FitzGerald; BBC News (July 7, 2025)
• July 2025 Central Texas floods
  Wikipedia (“This article documents a current event. Information may change rapidly and initial news reports may be unreliable. The latest updates to this article may not reflect the most current information….”)

The seemingly-inevitable political sound and fury working off the tragedies started yesterday (Sunday, July 6, 2025) — the usual baying of the hounds. I won’t be talking about that.

I will talk — briefly — about what I noticed in news coverage, how I see the situation, and the slight change it’s made in my daily routines.

Late-Breaking News: Details, Discrepancies, and Making Sense

Something that disturbed me early on, apart from what obviously was an appalling loss of life, were inconsistencies in the news.

For example, an article said that 27 pre-teen girls had been at a summer camp, and that the camp was not in session at the time.

I ran into that Saturday morning, but didn’t start posting about ‘Sinister Discrepancies at Summer Camp: WHAT ARE THEY HIDING???’ I’d probably get a whole lot more attention if I did, and that’s another topic.

Turns out that there are — or were — at least two camps involved.

They weren’t much more than a mile apart. One, Heart O’ the Hills, was on the Guadalupe River. Another, Camp Mystic, was sort of on the Guadalupe, but mostly on Cypress Creek. If I’m getting the names wrong, sorry about that: it’s what I found on Google Maps.

The point is that both camps were hit, hard. One was in session, the other not. Names of the camps and other details started getting resolved over the weekend. I’ve put a couple excerpts and links at the end of this post.¹

So, how come I didn’t see accurate coverage Saturday morning?

Priorities, Questions, and a Pre-Dawn Disaster

Part of the problem, I very strongly suspect, involves what’s important and what’s not.

A few hours after a major regional disaster most, if not all, of the folks who have any solid information are in the field. They’re trying to find people who are still alive, or coordinating efforts of those who are actively searching.

Making time to slowly and carefully explain to hyperventilating reporters which camps have how many known missing and dead? That might not be a high priority.

What’s obvious, so far, is that searchers have found almost a hundred dead bodies; and that the area’s getting more heavy rain and flash floods.

What may never be obvious is how so many folks apparently didn’t realize a flash flood was happening until they were in the water.

My guess, and it’s no more than that, is that flash floods don’t happen often enough in any one place to encourage staying up all night, waiting for a warning. Or evacuating low-lying spots each time there’s a heavy rain.

Notices that flash floods were in progress getting posted, starting around four in the morning — that probably accounts for much of what happened.

Disaster, Deaths, Doing What I Can

It hasn’t been all bad news.

Searchers have been finding folks who were still alive.

And I’ve been running across accounts of folks who’d been caught in the flood and risked their own lives to help others.

“…Julian Ryan, 27, died after trying to help his family escape their trailer home in Ingram, according to his sister, Connie Salas….

“…Dick Eastland, who served as the longtime director of Camp Mystic with his wife, died trying to save the lives of his campers, according to public officials….”
(“Texas flooding victims: From young campers to a dad saving his family, what we know about the lives lost” ; Emily Shapiro, Peter Charalambous; ABC News (July 7, 2025))

I’m not at all happy about what happened: but it’s nice, learning that folks do what’s right in difficult situations.

Now, looking at the ‘so what’ angle.

What happened in central Texas doesn’t affect me directly.

I didn’t know anyone who was in that area, and hadn’t been aware of either of the summer camps that were washed away. I gather that Camp Mystic has been owned and operated by the same family for generations, and that’s almost another topic.

Slight Change in Routine, Prayers

On the other hand, now I do know a little about the folks involved. Not much, but enough to let me include them in my daily prayer routine.

Part of that inclusion would have happened anyway, even if I’d never heard of the Independence Day floods. This prayer for the dead has been part of my routine for some time:

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them.
May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

But now that I know about what’s happening near the Guadalupe River, I’ve been asking God to comfort and console the survivors. And help everyone involved cope with what they’re experiencing.

I know: that’s no practical help at all.

But I’m just some old guy living in central Minnesota. There’s precious little I can do to change the course of mighty rivers, bend steel in my bare hands, and — well, you get the picture.

I did find some maybe-useful prayer resources. Those, I can share:

• Prayers for Death and Dying
  Prayers,USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops)
• Catholic Prayers for the Departed
  St. Patrick’s Parish, Toronto

I’ve maybe raised questions without answering them. I wrote most of this Monday afternoon — if you’ve got questions, put them in a comment. If I’ve got an answer, or at any rate a response; I’ll respond.

Anyway, I’ve talked about disasters and making sense before:

• “A Prayer For America: Seems Reasonable” (January 20, 2025)
  • Why Share This Prayer?
• “First Helene, Now Milton; Yikes: Another Major Hurricane” (October 12, 2024)
  • Something I Can Do
• “Hurricane Beryl: Sort-of-Good News, and Taking the Long View” (July 13, 2024)
  • The Siloam Reminder
  • It’s a Changing World
• “A House in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, Canada” (August 20, 2023)
  • Getting Slightly Serious About Silliness
• “Drought, Air Quality Alert: Living in the Upper Midwest” (July 24, 2021)
  • Love, Neighbors and Me

¹ Sunday, July 6, 2025; facts starting to get sorted out:

“…The floodwaters arrived with little warning, ripping through the picturesque riverfront area that is home to nearly 20 youth camps.

“Though Camp Mystic suffered the greatest losses, officials say the scale of the disaster is far-reaching.

“Nearby, the all-girls camp Heart O’ the Hills was also deluged.

“Its co-owner and director, Jane Ragsdale, was among the dead. Fortunately, the camp was out of session at the time….”
(“A girls’ summer camp swept away by a ‘horrific’ deluge” ; Gary O’Donoghue, Chief North America correspondent; Ana Faguy, BBC News (Saturday afternoon, July 6, 2025)) [emphasis mine]

From Wikipedia, Saturday, July 6, 2025, including links to the article’s sources:

“…At 1:18 pm CDT on July 3, 2025, the National Weather Service (NWS) office in San Antonio, Texas issued a flood watch for Kerr County and other areas that would later be impacted by severe flooding. The watch warned of 1-3 inches of rain, with isolated areas seeing closer to 5-7 inches. The watch noted that there would be ’rounds of scattered to widespread showers and storms with heavy rain rates possible.’^[6]

“Early on July 4, the Weather Prediction Center (WPC) branch of the NWS issued a mesoscale precipitation discussion citing that ‘areas of flash flooding will be likely across central TX overnight with very heavy rainfall expected. Hourly rainfall in excess of 2 to 3 inches seems reasonable given the environment and localized 6-hr totals over 6 inches will be possible’, and detailing that the potential flooding may have ‘significant impacts’.^[7] Another discussion issued at 6:27 am used stronger wording, warning that ‘Considerable to catastrophic flash flood impacts can continue to be expected.’^[8]

“Numerous flash flood warnings were issued throughout the event. Several of these warnings contained dire flash flood emergency wording. The first flash flood emergency was issued for Hunt and Ingram in Kerr County at 4:03 am on July 4, warning residents to ‘SEEK HIGHER GROUND NOW!’ and that rainfall rates of 2-4 inches/hour would continue to impact the area which had already seen 4-10 inches of rain.^[9] By 4:05, the Guadalupe River at Hunt had risen to 21.99 feet, rising over ten feet in an hour and reaching major flood stage. The river continued to surge, reaching 37.52 feet and still rising at 5:10 am when the gauge at Hunt stopped updating. This level marked the second highest ever recorded at Hunt, surpassing flash flooding that occurred in 1987.^[10][11] Multiple summer camps near Hunt, notably Camp Mystic, experienced catastrophic flooding. At Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp for girls, at least five campers aged 8-9 died, alongside a dozen that remain missing. [evening of July 6, 2025] The camp’s director and co-owner, Dick Eastland, also died, reportedly while trying to save campers from floodwaters.^[12][13] Another nearby girl’s camp, Heart O’ the Hills, was not in session, however the camp’s director Jane Ragsdale died during the flooding.^[14]…”
(July 2025 Central Texas floods > Preparations and Impact, Wikipedia (taken 5:50 p.m. (Minnesota, CDT (10:55 PM UTC/GMT) July 6, 2025) [emphasis mine]