I was on X yesterday and found this article written in 2002 about flash flood alley. It's a really good read.

https://www.edwardsaquifer.net/pdf/flood.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com

That was a good article. As usual, people building in flood plain areas, and go by 3 or 4 decades of experience, which is a nanosecond in geologic time.

Now being in my 50's and having lived in the Hill Country since I was a young kid, I am struggling with the realization of how many times I've read similar stories to what's unfolded in recent days. This may be the worst event I can recall as far as loss of life, but there have been other events where people lose their lives due to living or camping near running water in this notorious flash flood area. I get it, people want to be near water - a retirement dream for me is to have a property on running water. What surprises me a bit is we haven't come up with a better warning system. Despite the rain and river height gauges, this happened again.

Are there not affordable flood alarms that businesses or even home owners could install? Some type of sensor that, if submersed for a period of time adequate to negate false alarms would set off a remote solar and battery operated siren? With the pervasion of lightning detectors, which are effective at shutting down youth or adult sporting events and outdoor activities, why aren't there better flood triggered sirens in flood prone areas like Hill Country river valleys? I assume there is a reason - effectiveness or price or ??? - or we'd surely see something implemented by now. I hope to never see something like this happen again.

I think there's also a few things that haven't been talked about enough.

One is that every flood is a little different depending on where the heavy rains happen. Like the 2002 flood in Kerrville (when my parents house had several feet of water in it), most of the really bad damage was along the creeks. Quinlan and Town Creek. Yesterday the creek didn't get within 20 feet of my parent's house. So it's not like there's just one playbook you're playing from when you get a flash flood warning alert.

Another is that this was the early morning of the Fourth of July. Every campsite, cabin, Airbnb, etc between Hunt and Comfort was probably full. Just the absolute worst case scenario for something like this.

And the last is that the weather during the evening the night before was perfect. It hadn't like rained for days or anything to put you on high alert. My family and I were cooking hot dogs and eating s'mores in one of the mini cabins the evening of the 3rd.

bobinator said:

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I think there's also a few things that haven't been talked about enough.

One is that every flood is a little different depending on where the heavy rains happen. Like the 2002 flood in Kerrville (when my parents house had several feet of water in it), most of the really bad damage was along the creeks. Quinlan and Town Creek. Yesterday the creek didn't get within 20 feet of my parent's house. So it's not like there's just one playbook you're playing from when you get a flash flood warning alert.

Another is that this was the early morning of the Fourth of July. Every campsite, cabin, Airbnb, etc between Hunt and Comfort was probably full. Just the absolute worst case scenario for something like this.

And the last is that the weather during the evening the night before was perfect. It hadn't like rained for days or anything to put you on high alert. My family and I were cooking hot dogs and eating s'mores in one of the mini cabins the evening of the 3rd.

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I don't really see what that has to do with the original article and the points made are somewhat obvious. Each flood event can happen happen in different waterways. More people are affected when more people are near the water on holidays. FLASH floods happen unexpectedly, hence the name. These are all known facts.

But the original article highlights unique aspects about the Hill Country that make it prone to flash floods. There have been many historical events - yes, the worst hit areas will differ event to event - but the Hill Country is known globally by those that study flash flood events, due to it's fairly unique characteristics spelled out in OP article.

I can tell you how each event IS similar. Water rises suddenly in areas susceptible to flooding. Camp Mystic buildings (some, not all) are built in a known flood plain as seen in publicly accessible flood maps. That is most likely the case for your family's structures along Town and Quinlan creeks as well. The flood maps include "100 year" event heights and people roll the dice, as would I if locals say "yeah it's on a flood map but never seen water there".

I agree with you that Flash Flood Warnings can't target a specific waterway or location on a waterway for most impact. A Watch means it could happen, a Warning means it IS HAPPENING somewhere in the alert area (sometimes specific details are in the Warning text), but still we become numb to Warnings because they cover large areas and not the specific plot of land we are on. And we only get them if our phone is on, not in sleep mode, has cell service, power, etc.

So we have children's camps, RV lots, tent sites, and homes built in known Hill Country flood plains. We can agree that Flash Flood warnings are something, but not enough. Can anything better be done? ANY improvement we can make? The example I keep going back to is lightning detection, in the Austin area a child at a sports field lost their life due to lightning years ago and since then many youth sports facilities have a Thor or similar system installed to detect lightning. Lightning also affects different areas each strike, and is unexpected, and will have more impact when and where more are gathered - things you noted about flood challenges - but additional detection systems and rules have been put in place over recent years. US lightning deaths have steadily declined over past 30 years. Can't put detections systems everywhere but can protect children and large gatherings.

What I suggested regarding water tripped sensors setting off sirens may not be possible on a large scale, but in our most vulnerable waterways near the most populated areas perhaps?

More rain gauges and hydrometeorological stations have been added over the years, can more be added?

I understand the scale of area and property we are talking about, the acreage that is shown as flood prone on a flood map is quite vast. But I don't like waving a hand and saying nothing is possible because each event is different and weather was nice the night before. People are going to be in 100 year flood plains, no way to stop that, but something has to be improved at a minimum in our most flash flood prone and populated watersheds. To not rely on electric grid, or cell service, or have people sitting in front of a TV or NOAA radio, AND be effective in the middle of the night keeps me coming back to some type of automated and battery operated siren but there are more knowledgeable people who will have more ideas.

Sorry for the long post, as I stated before I've followed too many of these events in the hill country and just want to see continued improvement (there have already been many improvements) in the future.

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So we have children's camps, RV lots, tent sites, and homes built in known Hill Country flood plains. We can agree that Flash Flood warnings are something, but not enough. Can anything better be done?

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A warning is never going to be enough. There must be an evacuation plan that everyone is familiar with. Further, that plan must actually work. In other words, when the camps evac-ed, did they go to areas they thought were safe only to find out the hard way they weren't?

A warning without a plan is a recipe for disaster. An impromptu plan is no plan at all. A plan where not everyone is familiar with it is, again, borderline worthless, especially in the middle of the night. I think what we're going to find out in most of these cases is that plans in place were, at worst, unknown, and at best, ineffective due to the nature of the event.

The youth camp I went to growing up was on the banks of the Brazos. From topo maps, it appears (as best as I can tell) the area is roughly 70 feet above the base of the river, so flooding up there was unlikely if not impossible. However, there were several years where we took between 400-500 total people -- youth and adults -- and a middle of the night evac, even with busses, would have taken 2 hours minimum. But that's the thing -- in the middle of those weeks, the busses weren't there. They dropped us off on Monday morning and picked us up on Saturday morning. Getting the busses there, had it even been possible, would have taken an additional 3-4 hours.