Texas Flooding Signals Growing Extreme Weather Threats to Summer Camps – Inside Climate News

The deluge hit in the early morning hours of July 4. 

In the Hill Country region of central Texas, torrential rains triggered flash flooding that devastated communities along the Guadalupe River. Around 3 a.m., the river climbed about 1 foot every 5 minutes in Hunt, Texas, according to the National Weather Service. Water levels ultimately rose more than 29 feet, overtaking homes, cars and people in its path. 

More than 100 people died in the flooding, including at least 27 campers and counselors at Camp Mystic, a non-denominational Christian girls’ summer camp in Kerr County, which was hit the hardest. 

“Our hearts are broken alongside our families that are enduring this unimaginable tragedy. We are praying for them constantly,” reads a statement on Camp Mystic’s website. 

An analysis by ClimaMeter, a project developed by the Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l’Environnement, found that climate change exacerbated the heavy rain that caused the flooding, as my colleague Arcelia Martin reported. Research shows that flash flooding like this is becoming increasingly common and severe as warming temperatures enable the atmosphere to hold more moisture. 

This trend, along with other cascading climate change impacts like extreme heat, wildfire smoke pollution and booming tick populations, pose a uniquely high risk to summer camps, where children spend ample time outdoors. 

As global warming threatens to disrupt this summer pastime, camp organizers are scrambling to fortify their infrastructure against extreme weather.

Flash Flood Alley: Texas is no stranger to flooding: It suffers the highest number of flood deaths in the nation. Counties located in Hill Country are particularly at risk due to the area’s rocky topography and dry soils, which do not soak up much of the water that rushes from all angles during a rain event. 

The proximity to the Guadalupe River that makes places like Camp Mystic so desirable can also make them dangerous. As hundreds of young campers slept last Friday, severe rains filled the low-flow river, water spilling onto the campus and overtaking entire cabins. Counselors and children rushed to higher ground, but many did not make it. 

Callie McAlary, a 16-year-old Camp Mystic survivor, recounted her traumatic experience with the flooding in a recent interview with Fox News. 

“I knew some girls slept on trunks that night, some girls had to share beds, some girls slept on floors because they couldn’t go back to their cabin because it was so flooded in three cabins,” she said. “I put on my name tag because I was scared that if water was coming out next to other cabins that our cabin might be next. And I just put it on just for safekeeping. … In my head I was saying, ‘If something does happen, and I do get swept away, at least I’ll have my name on my body.’” 

It’s not the first time something like this has happened in Kerr County. In 1987, flash flooding killed 10 teenagers at a camp along the riverbed. 

Nearly two dozen summer camps line the river and its tributaries. Many of them were able to evacuate campers safely during the recent weekend storm. 

As of this morning, at least five campers and one counselor from Camp Mystic were still missing, CBS News reports. Search and rescue teams are scouring the tree- and debris-laden waters for survivors across Kerr County, though officials warn that more floods are a possibility in the coming days. 

Summer Risks: Each summer, more than 20 million children attend a camp across the U.S., according to the American Camp Association. Research shows that spending time outside is crucial for children’s health and can help improve physical and mental wellbeing. But what about when outdoor conditions are the health risk?  

One of the most common climate-related threats to summer campers is extreme heat. Children are more vulnerable than healthy adults to heat-related illnesses due to their small body mass and underdeveloped ability to regulate body temperatures, Victoria St. Martin reported for Inside Climate News last year. Anyone who has attended a summer camp likely knows that sweating through sizzling temperatures is almost a rite of passage, but this can go too far: In 2011, a camp in Connecticut had to temporarily close after a dozen Girl Scouts suffered from heat illnesses. 

“If you’re overheating, you can guarantee that the kids you are watching or playing with or supervising are getting overheated as well,” Dr. Alison Tothy, a pediatric emergency medicine physician who spends her summers working as a camp doctor in upstate New York, told The Associated Press. “It’s just something that we’ve now put on our list of reasons why someone might be sick. And I don’t think that we were doing that as much, even a few years ago.”

Meanwhile, wildfires in recent years have disrupted all sorts of camp activities. The New York Times reported in 2021 that one camp in Colorado had to evacuate attendees twice in the prior five years due to fires, which also caused long-term disruptions to nature trails. And wildfire smoke has worsened air quality around camps across the country, particularly in the Western and Midwestern U.S. 

Many camps are now taking steps to address compounding threats, from installing air conditioning or fans in rustic cabins to shifting entire schedules. In some cases, organizers are using these situations to teach children about climate change and help kids connect more deeply with the environment. However, extreme weather risks are increasingly forcing counselors to take a measure that goes against the very essence of a summer camp: sending kids inside. 

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