Camp Mystic flood probe finds deadly failures in warnings and evacuation

A flash flood warning went out at 1:14 a.m. on July 4, 2025, before water rose around the cabins at Camp Mystic and killed 25 campers, two teenage counselors and longtime director Richard “Dick” Eastland. State investigators concluded the century-old summer camp did not have the written emergency plans or evacuation measures required to protect girls when flash floods swept through the Texas Hill Country.

Campers and counselors at Camp Mystic began evacuating after 2 a.m., trying to wade to safety as water rose around the cabins. Kerr County emergency dispatchers requested the first water rescue at 3:35 a.m., by which point a U.S. Geological Survey gauge near Hunt was already showing almost 24 feet of water, a level considered major flood stage on the Guadalupe River.

Investigators also found the camp lacked adequate evacuation measures, and a June 2026 legislative report found cascading failures in communication and weak evacuation instructions helped turn the flood into a mass-casualty event. The report called the camp’s planning effectively “no plan at all.”

At an April 28, 2026 legislative hearing in Austin, Edward Eastland apologized to the victims’ families and told them, “We tried our hardest that night. It wasn’t enough to save your daughters.” Lawmakers pressed camp representatives over flood training, evacuation readiness and why state-required safeguards were missing at a site that had sent generations of girls to the banks of the Guadalupe.

By June, the Legislature had already passed laws addressing all but one of the deficiencies identified in the probe. The camp’s owners said they intended to reopen only the parts of Camp Mystic that did not flood, while the camp later filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.