Camp Mystic lawsuits filed

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

But maybe you shouldn’t just use word of mouth when it comes to the safety of your kids. That’s the lesson.

I mean these are people who are outsourcing all their kids’ basic needs to other people from the time they’re born. They’re in the habit of choosing the highly-rated help and trusting the reputation

Are you a SAHP who never had a babysitter or a child in daycare? Do you home school your child? Most parents in this area do work outside the home these days, and most get childcare solutions by getting references from other parents, checking online reviews and getting background checks for people working in their home.

If you're pulling flood maps and checking the building inspection report of your kids' school, more power to you, but most people don't do this.

Wow, you need to do more research about the places you send your kids to. This area is known for flooding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

But maybe you shouldn’t just use word of mouth when it comes to the safety of your kids. That’s the lesson.

I mean these are people who are outsourcing all their kids’ basic needs to other people from the time they’re born. They’re in the habit of choosing the highly-rated help and trusting the reputation

Are you a SAHP who never had a babysitter or a child in daycare? Do you home school your child? Most parents in this area do work outside the home these days, and most get childcare solutions by getting references from other parents, checking online reviews and getting background checks for people working in their home.

If you're pulling flood maps and checking the building inspection report of your kids' school, more power to you, but most people don't do this.

Wow, you need to do more research about the places you send your kids to. This area is known for flooding.

Yes Captain Obvious--I think the entire world knows that now. But clearly since a whole bunch of well-heeled Texans sent their kids there for decades, they may have missed this fact somehow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The camp owners should have discussed and involved the grieving families in their decision to reopen, and designing a memorial without family input is terrible.
I know it’s cultish and that has its appeal to some, but I can’t imagine sending my kids to a camp where children died and still have not been found and still knowing absolutely no idea how their last moments played out.

It was God's plan...

Your sarcasm is sick and inappropriate.

NP. I would say it’s sick and appropriate.

It is…however, as someone who lives in TX I can tell you there’s a sizable portion of the population who thinks like this. They think owners did nothing wrong and it was a flood no one could have expected and the camp should just reopen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of the lawsuits makes it very plain that if they had only allowed the girls to walk the short distance to the rec hall even 20 mins earlier or hours earlier..they’d be alive.
Also mentioned they moved equipment to higher ground before evacuating a single camper.

WHAT?? I did not know this before. This is criminal.

“The Camp Ignored the Warnings and Protected Equipment, Not Girls.

68. Richard and Edward met in the main office around 1:45 a.m., some 30 minutes after the warning. Rather than turning to the cabins, they convened the grounds crew and started securing equipment. The Camp reports it has a picture of Richard Eastland with the grounds crew at 2:13 a.m. still working on this task. By that point, 59 critical minutes had passed since defendants were warned
by the weather service of “life threatening flash flooding” impacting their camp.”

Page 15.
https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bellows-v-camp-mystic-lawsuit.pdf

So they had warning, they had time, they prioritized equipment over lives.

The equipment was outside and typically lower in elevation. Like everyone else, they were preparing for a typical flood, not a record-breaking one.

Even though this was well after they heard the announcement predicting record breaking flooding?

Who was predicting record-breaking flooding?

Thursday, July 3: First flood watches for the hard-hit area were issued in the afternoon around 1 p.m., predicting rain amounts of between 5 to 7 inches.

Kerr County warnings

Thursday, July 3, 12:41 a.m.: First flash flood watch (not to be confused with a flood watch) issued for Kerr County. Isolated rain amounts of 10 inches was mentioned.

Friday, July 4, 1:14 a.m.: Flash flood warning issued for Kerr County with the potential for life-threatening flooding.

Again, where's the prediction for *[b]record-level* flash flooding?

This is an area that frequently receives warnings for flash flooding. They were expecting a flash flood similar to the worst that they had seen. That's not great, but it is understandable.

It's not understandable when you're responsible for other people's children. In our school system, if there's a tornado warning, we live the portable classrooms and go inside the main building. We don't wait to see if it's really going to be bad or not. The actions of the Camp Mystic owners are indefensible.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

The husband knew enough to petition the state to have the doomed cabins removed from the flood plain so that he would be allowed to let girls sleep there.

They petitioned FEMA, likely hoping to reduce their flood insurance costs. And FEMA agreed with them. That seems to refute the claim they knew this was a plausible risk.

I grew up in the upper midwest with floods, but those were far slower floods than flash floods like this incident. It is mind-boggling to me how quickly this flood progressed-- the river rose 26 feet in 45 minutes!

Yes, the area was known for flash flooding, but every aspect of this was a worst-case scenario. This was the highest recorded flood level. It rose extraordinarily fast, even for this area. It happened over a holiday weekend, with less support/warning from local emergency services. And it occurred overnight, likely delaying their understanding of how bad the flood was getting and impairing evacuations.

I do think it was negligent to have cabins with kids that close to the river. And I think the camp should have been more careful with monitoring the situation and calling for evacuations. But it also seems like this was both a truly exceptional event and a situation where emergency services should have more infrastructure in place in detect and warn of major floods as they occur.

No. You are wrong. Stop making excuses for these people.
For the last two summers I worked for a few weeks at an overnight summer camp in NC. Had in-depth conversations with the camp owner about what it means to responsible for hundreds of young people in your care. How you anticipate problems, even worst case scenarios. How you spend money to make sure your camp is as safe as possible, and you happily invite inspections so you can be accredited.
She was so angry and disgusted with the Camp Mystic owners. As am I. They knew better, but were happy to cut corners and take those risks.

You often don't know you're in a worst-case scenario until after it's over. That's the problem. You need to make decisions off incomplete information. How do you balance the moderate-impact risks that are direct and apparent (i.e., an evacuation at night through severe weather) against unprecedented (and thus, highly unlikely) risks with catastrophic impacts (i.e., a record-level flood that grew in record time)?

Suppose it had been like the 1987 flood, but they chose to evacuate through dangerous conditions, leading to (a much smaller number of) injuries or deaths? People now would be saying they should have sheltered-in-place, on the basis that this kind of flood was highly unlikely.

PP here - the risk I’m talking about, mostly, is the location of the cabins. Why build cabins in a flood plain? It’s my understanding that camp mystic owners lobbied to have that particular area un-designated as a part of a flood plain. So, why did they do that? Money? Cram more campers into that camp?
Also, the camp where I worked had all kinds of storm/lightning/weather alert systems installed. Cost them a lot of money, but gotta keep kids safe! Doesn’t seem like the mystic folks felt the need to do that…

I tend to agree that putting cabins in a floodway was a bad choice, but I disagree with your accusation regarding the reason. If I'm looking at the map correctly, they have lots of space. Cabins could have gone elsewhere. But locations near water (e.g., rivers, lakes, ocean) are generally considered desirable locations, whether you're talking about homes or camps.

The circumstances don’t look a money grab, or a willful disregard for life. If they really thought the risk was high, they probably wouldn't have gone to FEMA to get areas removed from the floodway. And the fact that some areas were removed (no, not all) probably reinforced their belief. This looks more like a case of risk habituation or recency bias leading to a lower perceived risk, combined with this genuinely being an exceptional circumstance.

Some of the earlier posts contain factual, but misleading, descriptions of the events. For example, an earlier poster referenced water entering a cabin well before it was inundated. That easily could have been understood to mean the water from the river was already that high. But that's not what happened. That was rainwater coming down the hill. These were rustic cabins without much of foundation. Water probably went in them with any heavy rain. That's arguably a bit gross, but isn't something that would warrant an immediate evacuation during a storm.

That doesn't make it ok. I do think the camp was negligent. But I think many of you are going overstating things. I don't think you can or should assume that ill intentions, like greed, played a major role. And I don't think some posters here understand how exceptional the speed and magnitude of the flood was in this case. It looks like it the camp didn't understand the the risks or the circumstances. Maybe they should have, but I also think the county failed with it's obligations here, too, by failing to have a adequate warning system.

[Anonymous]

Were all of the Bubble girls in the camp owners’s truck when it was washed away? The counselors too? It is so awful that not a single person in that cabin survived.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

The husband knew enough to petition the state to have the doomed cabins removed from the flood plain so that he would be allowed to let girls sleep there.

They petitioned FEMA, likely hoping to reduce their flood insurance costs. And FEMA agreed with them. That seems to refute the claim they knew this was a plausible risk.

I grew up in the upper midwest with floods, but those were far slower floods than flash floods like this incident. It is mind-boggling to me how quickly this flood progressed-- the river rose 26 feet in 45 minutes!

Yes, the area was known for flash flooding, but every aspect of this was a worst-case scenario. This was the highest recorded flood level. It rose extraordinarily fast, even for this area. It happened over a holiday weekend, with less support/warning from local emergency services. And it occurred overnight, likely delaying their understanding of how bad the flood was getting and impairing evacuations.

I do think it was negligent to have cabins with kids that close to the river. And I think the camp should have been more careful with monitoring the situation and calling for evacuations. But it also seems like this was both a truly exceptional event and a situation where emergency services should have more infrastructure in place in detect and warn of major floods as they occur.

No. You are wrong. Stop making excuses for these people.
For the last two summers I worked for a few weeks at an overnight summer camp in NC. Had in-depth conversations with the camp owner about what it means to responsible for hundreds of young people in your care. How you anticipate problems, even worst case scenarios. How you spend money to make sure your camp is as safe as possible, and you happily invite inspections so you can be accredited.
She was so angry and disgusted with the Camp Mystic owners. As am I. They knew better, but were happy to cut corners and take those risks.

You often don't know you're in a worst-case scenario until after it's over. That's the problem. You need to make decisions off incomplete information. How do you balance the moderate-impact risks that are direct and apparent (i.e., an evacuation at night through severe weather) against unprecedented (and thus, highly unlikely) risks with catastrophic impacts (i.e., a record-level flood that grew in record time)?

Suppose it had been like the 1987 flood, but they chose to evacuate through dangerous conditions, leading to (a much smaller number of) injuries or deaths? People now would be saying they should have sheltered-in-place, on the basis that this kind of flood was highly unlikely.

PP here - the risk I’m talking about, mostly, is the location of the cabins. Why build cabins in a flood plain? It’s my understanding that camp mystic owners lobbied to have that particular area un-designated as a part of a flood plain. So, why did they do that? Money? Cram more campers into that camp?
Also, the camp where I worked had all kinds of storm/lightning/weather alert systems installed. Cost them a lot of money, but gotta keep kids safe! Doesn’t seem like the mystic folks felt the need to do that…

I tend to agree that putting cabins in a floodway was a bad choice, but I disagree with your accusation regarding the reason. If I'm looking at the map correctly, they have lots of space. Cabins could have gone elsewhere. But locations near water (e.g., rivers, lakes, ocean) are generally considered desirable locations, whether you're talking about homes or camps.

The circumstances don’t look a money grab, or a willful disregard for life. If they really thought the risk was high, they probably wouldn't have gone to FEMA to get areas removed from the floodway. And the fact that some areas were removed (no, not all) probably reinforced their belief. This looks more like a case of risk habituation or recency bias leading to a lower perceived risk, combined with this genuinely being an exceptional circumstance.

Some of the earlier posts contain factual, but misleading, descriptions of the events. For example, an earlier poster referenced water entering a cabin well before it was inundated. That easily could have been understood to mean the water from the river was already that high. But that's not what happened. That was rainwater coming down the hill. These were rustic cabins without much of foundation. Water probably went in them with any heavy rain. That's arguably a bit gross, but isn't something that would warrant an immediate evacuation during a storm.

That doesn't make it ok. I do think the camp was negligent. But I think many of you are going overstating things. I don't think you can or should assume that ill intentions, like greed, played a major role. And I don't think some posters here understand how exceptional the speed and magnitude of the flood was in this case. It looks like it the camp didn't understand the the risks or the circumstances. Maybe they should have, but I also think the county failed with it's obligations here, too, by failing to have a adequate warning system.

When camping, you really should avoid areas close to water. It helps to avoid contaminating the immediate watershed and water is always unpredictable.

[Anonymous]

Hello. I know I need to read the thread but I can't bring myself to do it yet. I know I will get bogged down in trying to correct misinformation and also just get sad again in general.

I have young relatives who survived the flood at Mystic. One of them was one of the ones who floated on a mattress for hours.

Three generations of my family (male and female) have attended/attend the camps on the Guadalupe, myself included.

I know some of the Eastlands. I have multiple other friends who live in Hunt/Ingram/Kerrville who were impacted in multiple and tragic ways.

I know people who died in the floods who were not at Mystic. I feel these lives are often overlooked in this entire situation/discussion. Two campers at different camps were orphaned because their families were staying along the river and died that night. Siblings too.

I was recently in Hunt and it looks like an ocean came through the south fork of the Guadalupe. I am surprised more people did not die, including Mystic campers and campers at La Junta. Heart of the Hills was miraculously spared of camper deaths (though the director died) because they were not in session that day.

I don't know what my point is. I think the Eastlands do not deserve the blame they are getting for their actions or lack of actions that night. I think where the camp has been negligent is keeping the location of some of the cabins too close to the river and then how they have handled the situation and communication in the aftermath. I don't think the Guadalupe Camp should open again. Maybe Cypress but probably under new leadership.

I think the Republican leadership in the state is relieved to have the camps as a punching bag to deflect from their own culpability. This includes the county. They were pathetic.

I predicted that once the initial wave of support and sympathy ebbed and the families of the lost girls started taking legal action that there would be a big divide among Mystic families in Dallas, Houston, and Austin. That is definitely happening now.

I typed way more than I meant to. These are just my thoughts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

But maybe you shouldn’t just use word of mouth when it comes to the safety of your kids. That’s the lesson.

I mean these are people who are outsourcing all their kids’ basic needs to other people from the time they’re born. They’re in the habit of choosing the highly-rated help and trusting the reputation

Are you a SAHP who never had a babysitter or a child in daycare? Do you home school your child? Most parents in this area do work outside the home these days, and most get childcare solutions by getting references from other parents, checking online reviews and getting background checks for people working in their home.

If you're pulling flood maps and checking the building inspection report of your kids' school, more power to you, but most people don't do this.

Oh you’re the parent who leaves their kids with a random sitter in a foreign country so you and hubby can have fun. Meanwhile you shopped online for 32 hours to find the right swimsuit. Totally outsource the care of who is ostensibly your most loved person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

The husband knew enough to petition the state to have the doomed cabins removed from the flood plain so that he would be allowed to let girls sleep there.

They petitioned FEMA, likely hoping to reduce their flood insurance costs. And FEMA agreed with them. That seems to refute the claim they knew this was a plausible risk.

I grew up in the upper midwest with floods, but those were far slower floods than flash floods like this incident. It is mind-boggling to me how quickly this flood progressed-- the river rose 26 feet in 45 minutes!

Yes, the area was known for flash flooding, but every aspect of this was a worst-case scenario. This was the highest recorded flood level. It rose extraordinarily fast, even for this area. It happened over a holiday weekend, with less support/warning from local emergency services. And it occurred overnight, likely delaying their understanding of how bad the flood was getting and impairing evacuations.

I do think it was negligent to have cabins with kids that close to the river. And I think the camp should have been more careful with monitoring the situation and calling for evacuations. But it also seems like this was both a truly exceptional event and a situation where emergency services should have more infrastructure in place in detect and warn of major floods as they occur.

No. You are wrong. Stop making excuses for these people.
For the last two summers I worked for a few weeks at an overnight summer camp in NC. Had in-depth conversations with the camp owner about what it means to responsible for hundreds of young people in your care. How you anticipate problems, even worst case scenarios. How you spend money to make sure your camp is as safe as possible, and you happily invite inspections so you can be accredited.
She was so angry and disgusted with the Camp Mystic owners. As am I. They knew better, but were happy to cut corners and take those risks.

You often don't know you're in a worst-case scenario until after it's over. That's the problem. You need to make decisions off incomplete information. How do you balance the moderate-impact risks that are direct and apparent (i.e., an evacuation at night through severe weather) against unprecedented (and thus, highly unlikely) risks with catastrophic impacts (i.e., a record-level flood that grew in record time)?

Suppose it had been like the 1987 flood, but they chose to evacuate through dangerous conditions, leading to (a much smaller number of) injuries or deaths? People now would be saying they should have sheltered-in-place, on the basis that this kind of flood was highly unlikely.

PP here - the risk I’m talking about, mostly, is the location of the cabins. Why build cabins in a flood plain? It’s my understanding that camp mystic owners lobbied to have that particular area un-designated as a part of a flood plain. So, why did they do that? Money? Cram more campers into that camp?
Also, the camp where I worked had all kinds of storm/lightning/weather alert systems installed. Cost them a lot of money, but gotta keep kids safe! Doesn’t seem like the mystic folks felt the need to do that…

I tend to agree that putting cabins in a floodway was a bad choice, but I disagree with your accusation regarding the reason. If I'm looking at the map correctly, they have lots of space. Cabins could have gone elsewhere. But locations near water (e.g., rivers, lakes, ocean) are generally considered desirable locations, whether you're talking about homes or camps.

The circumstances don’t look a money grab, or a willful disregard for life. If they really thought the risk was high, they probably wouldn't have gone to FEMA to get areas removed from the floodway. And the fact that some areas were removed (no, not all) probably reinforced their belief. This looks more like a case of risk habituation or recency bias leading to a lower perceived risk, combined with this genuinely being an exceptional circumstance.

Some of the earlier posts contain factual, but misleading, descriptions of the events. For example, an earlier poster referenced water entering a cabin well before it was inundated. That easily could have been understood to mean the water from the river was already that high. But that's not what happened. That was rainwater coming down the hill. These were rustic cabins without much of foundation. Water probably went in them with any heavy rain. That's arguably a bit gross, but isn't something that would warrant an immediate evacuation during a storm.

That doesn't make it ok. I do think the camp was negligent. But I think many of you are going overstating things. I don't think you can or should assume that ill intentions, like greed, played a major role. And I don't think some posters here understand how exceptional the speed and magnitude of the flood was in this case. It looks like it the camp didn't understand the the risks or the circumstances. Maybe they should have, but I also think the county failed with it's obligations here, too, by failing to have a adequate warning system.

When camping, you really should avoid areas close to water. It helps to avoid contaminating the immediate watershed and water is always unpredictable.

Yet, campgrounds and cabins are frequently close to water.

[Anonymous]

Read this piece, published 14 years before the tragic events. The camp owners were negligent and basically pushed to disregard basic safety requirements. It's really not debatable.

https://www.texasmonthly.com/being-texan/the-not-so-happy-campers/

The state of Texas is also responsible; I lived in TX for a few years and it's a wonderful place. But its politics are really toxic.

As a parent I have endless sympathy for the families. How could they have imagined that this institution has survived by cutting corners on safety?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Read this piece, published 14 years before the tragic events. The camp owners were negligent and basically pushed to disregard basic safety requirements. It's really not debatable.

https://www.texasmonthly.com/being-texan/the-not-so-happy-campers/

The state of Texas is also responsible; I lived in TX for a few years and it's a wonderful place. But its politics are really toxic.

As a parent I have endless sympathy for the families. How could they have imagined that this institution has survived by cutting corners on safety?

Is that the right article? It's about the camp, but it doesn't seem to get into anything related to safety.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

But maybe you shouldn’t just use word of mouth when it comes to the safety of your kids. That’s the lesson.

I mean these are people who are outsourcing all their kids’ basic needs to other people from the time they’re born. They’re in the habit of choosing the highly-rated help and trusting the reputation

Are you a SAHP who never had a babysitter or a child in daycare? Do you home school your child? Most parents in this area do work outside the home these days, and most get childcare solutions by getting references from other parents, checking online reviews and getting background checks for people working in their home.

If you're pulling flood maps and checking the building inspection report of your kids' school, more power to you, but most people don't do this.

Wow, you need to do more research about the places you send your kids to. This area is known for flooding.

NP, most parents are not equipped to make this sort of evaluation and if you put the responsibility on them, more kids will continue to die in situations like this. The cabins should not have been located so close to the river, and the warning systems were inadequate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

The husband knew enough to petition the state to have the doomed cabins removed from the flood plain so that he would be allowed to let girls sleep there.

They petitioned FEMA, likely hoping to reduce their flood insurance costs. And FEMA agreed with them. That seems to refute the claim they knew this was a plausible risk.

I grew up in the upper midwest with floods, but those were far slower floods than flash floods like this incident. It is mind-boggling to me how quickly this flood progressed-- the river rose 26 feet in 45 minutes!

Yes, the area was known for flash flooding, but every aspect of this was a worst-case scenario. This was the highest recorded flood level. It rose extraordinarily fast, even for this area. It happened over a holiday weekend, with less support/warning from local emergency services. And it occurred overnight, likely delaying their understanding of how bad the flood was getting and impairing evacuations.

I do think it was negligent to have cabins with kids that close to the river. And I think the camp should have been more careful with monitoring the situation and calling for evacuations. But it also seems like this was both a truly exceptional event and a situation where emergency services should have more infrastructure in place in detect and warn of major floods as they occur.

No. You are wrong. Stop making excuses for these people.
For the last two summers I worked for a few weeks at an overnight summer camp in NC. Had in-depth conversations with the camp owner about what it means to responsible for hundreds of young people in your care. How you anticipate problems, even worst case scenarios. How you spend money to make sure your camp is as safe as possible, and you happily invite inspections so you can be accredited.
She was so angry and disgusted with the Camp Mystic owners. As am I. They knew better, but were happy to cut corners and take those risks.

You often don't know you're in a worst-case scenario until after it's over. That's the problem. You need to make decisions off incomplete information. How do you balance the moderate-impact risks that are direct and apparent (i.e., an evacuation at night through severe weather) against unprecedented (and thus, highly unlikely) risks with catastrophic impacts (i.e., a record-level flood that grew in record time)?

Suppose it had been like the 1987 flood, but they chose to evacuate through dangerous conditions, leading to (a much smaller number of) injuries or deaths? People now would be saying they should have sheltered-in-place, on the basis that this kind of flood was highly unlikely.

PP here - the risk I’m talking about, mostly, is the location of the cabins. Why build cabins in a flood plain? It’s my understanding that camp mystic owners lobbied to have that particular area un-designated as a part of a flood plain. So, why did they do that? Money? Cram more campers into that camp?
Also, the camp where I worked had all kinds of storm/lightning/weather alert systems installed. Cost them a lot of money, but gotta keep kids safe! Doesn’t seem like the mystic folks felt the need to do that…

I tend to agree that putting cabins in a floodway was a bad choice, but I disagree with your accusation regarding the reason. If I'm looking at the map correctly, they have lots of space. Cabins could have gone elsewhere. But locations near water (e.g., rivers, lakes, ocean) are generally considered desirable locations, whether you're talking about homes or camps.

The circumstances don’t look a money grab, or a willful disregard for life. If they really thought the risk was high, they probably wouldn't have gone to FEMA to get areas removed from the floodway. And the fact that some areas were removed (no, not all) probably reinforced their belief. This looks more like a case of risk habituation or recency bias leading to a lower perceived risk, combined with this genuinely being an exceptional circumstance.

Some of the earlier posts contain factual, but misleading, descriptions of the events. For example, an earlier poster referenced water entering a cabin well before it was inundated. That easily could have been understood to mean the water from the river was already that high. But that's not what happened. That was rainwater coming down the hill. These were rustic cabins without much of foundation. Water probably went in them with any heavy rain. That's arguably a bit gross, but isn't something that would warrant an immediate evacuation during a storm.

That doesn't make it ok. I do think the camp was negligent. But I think many of you are going overstating things. I don't think you can or should assume that ill intentions, like greed, played a major role. And I don't think some posters here understand how exceptional the speed and magnitude of the flood was in this case. It looks like it the camp didn't understand the the risks or the circumstances. Maybe they should have, but I also think the county failed with it's obligations here, too, by failing to have a adequate warning system.

When camping, you really should avoid areas close to water. It helps to avoid contaminating the immediate watershed and water is always unpredictable.

Yet, campgrounds and cabins are frequently close to water.

The minimum suggested distance is 200 feet. I gather some of the cabins were closer. Do you think 200 feet is close?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:So many parents dont investigate. They just assume someone is taking care of that stuff, even more so with rich people.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of this. DD spent a good chunk of her summers from ages 10-18 at a camp that I never saw much beyond the pickup/dropoff point, which looked lovely and very safe. Last year, she finally took us on a tour of the entire camp and I was shocked at how isolated and remote some of the areas were. I do think that they had excellent emergency plans in place, but I could also see how things could get dangerous really fast.

I mean, it was a camp for rich/upper middle class girls that has been around for generations. A lot of us go off of word of mouth recs from other parents rather than analyzing camp maps and flood risk data.

But yes the camp deserves to be sued. The wife of the camp owner who died had to be helicoptered out one year because of flood waters. They certainly knew how dangerous the situation was.

The husband knew enough to petition the state to have the doomed cabins removed from the flood plain so that he would be allowed to let girls sleep there.

They petitioned FEMA, likely hoping to reduce their flood insurance costs. And FEMA agreed with them. That seems to refute the claim they knew this was a plausible risk.

I grew up in the upper midwest with floods, but those were far slower floods than flash floods like this incident. It is mind-boggling to me how quickly this flood progressed-- the river rose 26 feet in 45 minutes!

Yes, the area was known for flash flooding, but every aspect of this was a worst-case scenario. This was the highest recorded flood level. It rose extraordinarily fast, even for this area. It happened over a holiday weekend, with less support/warning from local emergency services. And it occurred overnight, likely delaying their understanding of how bad the flood was getting and impairing evacuations.

I do think it was negligent to have cabins with kids that close to the river. And I think the camp should have been more careful with monitoring the situation and calling for evacuations. But it also seems like this was both a truly exceptional event and a situation where emergency services should have more infrastructure in place in detect and warn of major floods as they occur.

No. You are wrong. Stop making excuses for these people.
For the last two summers I worked for a few weeks at an overnight summer camp in NC. Had in-depth conversations with the camp owner about what it means to responsible for hundreds of young people in your care. How you anticipate problems, even worst case scenarios. How you spend money to make sure your camp is as safe as possible, and you happily invite inspections so you can be accredited.
She was so angry and disgusted with the Camp Mystic owners. As am I. They knew better, but were happy to cut corners and take those risks.

You often don't know you're in a worst-case scenario until after it's over. That's the problem. You need to make decisions off incomplete information. How do you balance the moderate-impact risks that are direct and apparent (i.e., an evacuation at night through severe weather) against unprecedented (and thus, highly unlikely) risks with catastrophic impacts (i.e., a record-level flood that grew in record time)?

Suppose it had been like the 1987 flood, but they chose to evacuate through dangerous conditions, leading to (a much smaller number of) injuries or deaths? People now would be saying they should have sheltered-in-place, on the basis that this kind of flood was highly unlikely.

PP here - the risk I’m talking about, mostly, is the location of the cabins. Why build cabins in a flood plain? It’s my understanding that camp mystic owners lobbied to have that particular area un-designated as a part of a flood plain. So, why did they do that? Money? Cram more campers into that camp?
Also, the camp where I worked had all kinds of storm/lightning/weather alert systems installed. Cost them a lot of money, but gotta keep kids safe! Doesn’t seem like the mystic folks felt the need to do that…

I tend to agree that putting cabins in a floodway was a bad choice, but I disagree with your accusation regarding the reason. If I'm looking at the map correctly, they have lots of space. Cabins could have gone elsewhere. But locations near water (e.g., rivers, lakes, ocean) are generally considered desirable locations, whether you're talking about homes or camps.

The circumstances don’t look a money grab, or a willful disregard for life. If they really thought the risk was high, they probably wouldn't have gone to FEMA to get areas removed from the floodway. And the fact that some areas were removed (no, not all) probably reinforced their belief. This looks more like a case of risk habituation or recency bias leading to a lower perceived risk, combined with this genuinely being an exceptional circumstance.

Some of the earlier posts contain factual, but misleading, descriptions of the events. For example, an earlier poster referenced water entering a cabin well before it was inundated. That easily could have been understood to mean the water from the river was already that high. But that's not what happened. That was rainwater coming down the hill. These were rustic cabins without much of foundation. Water probably went in them with any heavy rain. That's arguably a bit gross, but isn't something that would warrant an immediate evacuation during a storm.

That doesn't make it ok. I do think the camp was negligent. But I think many of you are going overstating things. I don't think you can or should assume that ill intentions, like greed, played a major role. And I don't think some posters here understand how exceptional the speed and magnitude of the flood was in this case. It looks like it the camp didn't understand the the risks or the circumstances. Maybe they should have, but I also think the county failed with it's obligations here, too, by failing to have a adequate warning system.

When camping, you really should avoid areas close to water. It helps to avoid contaminating the immediate watershed and water is always unpredictable.

Yet, campgrounds and cabins are frequently close to water.

Also don't put tents under large tree limbs. I know someone who died when a limb fell on their tent and killed them.