How a midnight flash flood turned a Texas summer camp into a disaster zone

Photos show the aftermath of the flooding in central Texas

On the night of July 3, 195 girls settled into their bunks at Camp Mystic, a family-run summer camp along the Guadalupe River in Texas. Taps played after 10 p.m., and the Eastland family — who had owned and run the camp for generations — monitored the forecast from their homes on the property. Heavy rain was expected. Flooding along the river was common. But nothing in the camp’s long history resembled what was coming overnight, the New York Times reported.

Early signs of danger and rising unease

Shortly after 1 am, the National Weather Service issued a warning about life-threatening flash floods. Dick Eastland, the 70-year-old camp patriarch, was already awake, checking gauges and radioing his son Edward. Staff pulled canoes from the waterfront and watched creeks that were normally dry turn into fast-moving channels. Counsellors from Bug House — a cabin closest to the river — reported water streaming toward their door. The elder Eastland tried to reassure them. For decades, these were the familiar contours of a “normal flood.”

A sudden escalation as water surged into cabins

Around 3 am, everything changed. A counsellor at the riverside gatehouse reported water inside her cabin before her radio cut out. Edward and his father raced to Bug House and ordered an evacuation. Staff began loading girls into pickups and guiding them toward the recreation hall. But the water was now rising with alarming speed, covering the road, climbing to the tops of truck tires and pushing into the youngest campers’ cabins — Twins and Bubble Inn — where bunk beds stood only inches below low ceilings.

Desperate rescues in darkness

By 3.50 am, water around Bubble Inn and Twins had risen several feet. The Eastlands attempted to reach both cabins, but currents had turned into rapids. In the Twins cabins, eight-year-old girls huddled together atop bunk beds as water surged through windows. Edward tried to hold the doorframes as campers were swept past him. He managed to grab two girls before being submerged himself. His Apple Watch later showed he went underwater at 4:09 a.m.

A father lost attempting to save the youngest campers

Dick Eastland had parked his SUV outside Bubble Inn, likely trying to load children inside. Minutes later, the flood picked up the vehicle and hurled it across the field into a grove of cypress trees. Crash-data logs show the impact occurred at 3:51 a.m. He was found dead inside the SUV along with three campers.

Children swept from their cabins into the Guadalupe

In the chaos, girls were carried out of the Twins cabins and into the dark, fast-moving water. Some managed to grab branches. Others were swept downstream. Survivors later told rescuers they clung to trees for nearly an hour as water thrashed around them. Several counsellors and campers survived by holding onto the same pair of trees below Bug House until the flood began to recede.

The scale of the tragedy comes into view

At dawn, the devastation was clear. Twenty-five campers and two counsellors had died, along with Dick Eastland. Eleven of the dead were from the Twins cabins. All 13 girls and both counsellors in Bubble Inn were lost. One child, eight-year-old Cile Steward, is still missing. Waterlines measured by investigators showed levels rising above seven feet in the cabins — far beyond anything recorded in the camp’s 99-year history.

A community grieving, and deep questions ahead

Families have filed lawsuits alleging negligence, arguing the camp waited too long to evacuate and lacked a flood-specific plan. The Eastlands say they believed the cabins were on safe, elevated ground based on decades of experience and a revised FEMA map that removed the buildings from the floodplain.

Texas lawmakers plan hearings. The camp says it will never again house children in the riverside cabins that flooded. But for survivors, parents and the Eastland family — now mourning its own patriarch — answers remain elusive.

“Every morning is horrible,” Edward said. “We are so sorry. I just want to help the families. I don’t know how.”