At least 161 people are still missing in a single Texas county four days after deadly and devastating flash floods hit parts of the state last week, Governor Greg Abbott said, as hope fades for survivors to be found alive.
The missing in the hard-hit Kerr County include five campers and one counsellor from Camp Mystic, a Christian all-girls summer camp located on the banks of Guadalupe river.
At least 109 people have died in the disaster, including 94 in the Kerrville area alone, Abbott said in a news conference on Tuesday.
Texas is not alone. New Mexico is now seeing a flash flood emergency as well, with the National Weather Service (NWS) warning of intense flooding Tuesday night.
Frantic search and rescue efforts continue in Texas, with Abbott vowing emergency crews “will not stop until every missing person is accounted for”.
Abbott added that it is very likely more missing will be added to the list in the coming days, and urged people to report anyone they think is unaccounted for.
General Thomas Suelzer from the Texas National Guard said search efforts include Chinook and Black Hawk helicopters with rescue hoists.
He said there are 13 Black Hawk helicopters helping in the search effort, including four that arrived from Arkansas. He added that authorities were also using reaper drones.
In New Mexico, the NWS declared a flash flood emergency on Tuesday and told residents of Ruidoso, New Mexico, to be on high alert for flooding.
Officials there are already working to rescue people trapped in floodwaters and houses are reportedly being washed away.
A flood wave on the Rio Ruidoso has reached 15 feet (4.5m), the NWS in Albuquerque said in a post on X.
“Stay away from the river! Seek higher ground NOW!” they wrote.
In Texas, responders from various agencies are working together on rescue efforts, including agents from border patrol, the FBI and the National Guard.
More than 250 responders from various agencies have been assigned to the Kerrville area alone to help with search and rescue.
Questions have been raised about whether authorities provided adequate flood warnings before the disaster, and why people were not evacuated earlier.
Experts say there were a number of factors that contributed to the tragedy in Texas, including the extreme weather, the location of the holiday homes and timing.
The governor, who had spent part of the day surveying the flood zone, said authorities had issued a storm warning and knew about a possible flash flood, but “didn’t know the magnitude of the storm”.
No one knew it would lead to a “30-foot high tsunami wall of water”, he said.
The governor responded to a question about who was to “blame” for the enormous death toll, saying: “That’s the word choice of losers.”
He made a sports analogy, saying American football teams make mistakes; champion teams are the ones who don’t “point fingers”.
Most of the victims died in Kerr County, where the Guadalupe River was swollen by torrential downpours before daybreak on Friday, the July Fourth public holiday.
Camp Mystic had earlier confirmed at least 27 girls and staff were among the dead.
They said in a statement on Monday: “Our hearts are broken alongside our families that are enduring this unimaginable tragedy.”
President Donald Trump will travel to the flood-ravaged areas with First Lady Melania Trump on Friday.
