Texas, flash flood
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Sisters Blair Harber, 13, and Brooke Harber, 11, were killed, along with their grandparents, when surging floodwaters ripped through the community. Their parents were staying in a different home at Casa Bonita and survived, according to the family's GoFundMe.
More than 111 people have died across six counties after flash flooding from heavy rain began affecting the state last week.
On Wednesday, hundreds prayed, wept, and held one another at a prayer service, among the first of many somber gatherings to come in the weeks ahead.
After catastrophic floods hit Texas' Hill Country, many are asking about preparations for the next big flood. Jason Allen spoke to Jay Banner, climatologist at University of Texas at Austin, on the banks of the Guadalupe River.
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Flash floods surged through in the middle of the night, but many local officials appeared unaware of the unfolding catastrophe, initially leaving people near the river on their own.
Officials at the Comfort Volunteer Fire Department triggered a flood warning siren last week when the Guadalupe River began to swell.
Flash floods happen when heavy rains unleash more water than the ground can absorb, causing that water to pile up and flow to low-lying areas
When the precipitation intensified in the early morning hours Friday, many people failed to receive or respond to flood warnings at riverside campsites known to be in the floodplain.
Renee Smajstrla, a 8-year-old straight-A student from Ingram, Texas, who had played a role in her school’s production of “The Wizard of Oz,” was one of the victims who died in the flash floods at Camp Mystic, her family said.
Q: Is it true that if President Donald Trump hadn’t defunded the National Weather Service, the death toll in the Texas flooding would have been far lower or nonexistent? A: The Trump administration did not defund the NWS but did reduce the staff by 600 people.