Here’s what to know as another day of searches and recovery get underway in Kerr County.
SAN ANTONIO — This article includes reporting from the Texas Tribune.
Search and rescue efforts continue Tuesday as crews look for the dozens still missing from the July Fourth floods that devastated the Kerr County area.
Monday, volunteers were told to stand down in their efforts as heavy rain threatened more flooding. Only teams working under the direction of Kerr County Emergency Operations Center Unified Command were permitted in the response zone. This came after all search and rescue operations were suspended Sunday due to heavy rain and street-level flooding.
In a press conference Monday, Governor Greg Abbott said 131 people have died in the statewide floods. He also said the number of missing people is now at 97. That is much less than 161 reported missing at a Kerrville City Council meeting Monday morning.
Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said during a commissioners court meeting Monday that the search for missing people could take up to six months, but setting a time estimate is also difficult.
Abbott said Monday most of those still considered missing were people who did not check into hotels or campsites. Abbott said many of those people were added to the list of people who haven’t been located after friends and family reported them missing.
“Those who are missing on this list, most of them, were more difficult to identify because there was no record of them logging in anywhere,” Abbott said.
Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly, the county’s top official, said during a county commissioners court meeting earlier Monday that local officials don’t know the exact number of how many visitors who traveled to the Guadalupe for the holiday weekend had been caught in the flood.
Both Kelly and Abbott said officials had a grasp of how many county residents and people at camps along the river are missing.
The devastating flood is already one of the deadliest natural disasters in recent Texas history. The 1900 hurricane in Galveston claimed over 8,000 lives and the 1921 San Antonio floods killed 215 people. If official estimates that 97 people are still missing is not an overcount, then the final death toll of the Hill Country floods would surpass those of the 1921 floods, potentially making it the second most catastrophic natural disaster in Texas.