The death toll from catastrophic floods in Texas reached at least 80 on Sunday, including 28 children, as the search for girls missing from a summer camp continued.
Search teams are using helicopters, boats and drones to look for victims in flash floods that have torn across central Texas since the at the start of the July Fourth weekend. More than 80 people have died and many more are still missing, including at least 10 girls from a summer camp.
At the center of the tragedy is the scenic Texas Hill Country, where volunteers and some families of the missing have searched the riverbanks despite being asked not to do so. Authorities in surrounding areas closer to Austin, the state capital, have also recovered victims from floodwaters.
Larry Leitha, sheriff of Kerr County in Texas Hill Country, said 68 people had died in flooding in his county, the epicenter of the flooding, among them 28 children. Texas Governor Greg Abbott, speaking at a press conference on Sunday afternoon, said another 10 had died elsewhere in Texas and confirmed 41 were missing.
Flash floods striking with the force to rip away concrete slabs and giant trees tore across Guadalupe River banks dotted with children’s camps and campgrounds.
Kerr County authorities had confirmed at least 68 deaths as of Sunday and said they had no way to total the number of missing across the county, the hardest-hit by the floods.
Six people in Travis County died in the flooding, county spokesman Hector Nieto said Sunday evening. The flash floods along creeks carried away homes, trailers, cars and people in the northwest portion of the county.
Travis County Judge Andy Brown, the top executive of the county, said earlier Sunday that some 50 people have been rescued by helicopter, in boats, and on foot. They’ve also sent resources to Kerr County, knowing that it was harder hit. While a flood watch remains in effect, officials say they have neutralized the initial emergency.
Authorities in the largely rural Brunet county, which borders Travis County, reported three dead and five people missing in floodwaters that surged out of Cow Creek and other waterways.
Two deaths were reported in both Kendall and Williamson counties, and there was one in Tom Green County.
In Williamson County, in the north suburbs of Austin, the U.S. military at nearby Fort Hood helped evacuate 16 people people from a home for disabled children, County Judge Steve Snell said. The victim in Tom Green County was a woman whose body was found outside her submerged car in the city of San Angelo.