Kerrville, Texas — Many of the voices were frantic and desperate. A few were steady and calm amidst growing and terrifying danger and, in some cases, inevitable doom.
They came from families huddled on rooftops to escape the rising and swirling waters, mothers terrified for the safety of their children and onlookers who heard people screaming for help through the darkness as they clung to the treetops.
One man, who was stuck at the top of a tree when it began to collapse under the pressure of floodwaters, asked emergency dispatchers to rescue them by helicopter, but they never came.
Their pleas were among more than 400 calls for help across Kerr County last summer Devastating floods It struck during the overnight hours on the Fourth of July holiday. Recordings of the 911 calls were released Friday.
The sheer volume of calls would overwhelm the county’s two emergency dispatchers on duty in the Texas Hill Country. Catastrophic floods Submersible cabins and Youth camps Along the Guadalupe River.
“There’s water filling up really fast, and we can’t get out of our cabin,” a camp counselor told the dispatcher over campers screaming in the background. “We can’t get out of our cabin, so how can we get to the boats?”
Amazingly, everyone in the cabin and the rest of the campers at Camp La Junta were rescued.
Flooding claimed at least 136 lives statewide over the weekend, including at least 117 in Kerr County alone. Most were from Texas, but others came from Alabama, California and Florida, according to a list released by county officials.
One woman called for help when water sealed her home near Mystic Camp, a century-old summer Girls campWhere 25 campers and two teenage counselors died.
“We’re fine, but we live a mile from Camp Mystic, and we had two little girls who came down the river. We got to them, but I’m not sure how many more there are,” she said, her voice trembling.
A spokesman for the parents and counselors of children who died at Camp Mystic declined to comment on the release of the recordings.
Many residents in the hard-hit Texas Hill Country said they were surprised You received no warning When floods flooded the Guadalupe River. Kerr County leaders I faced scrutiny About whether they did enough right away. Two officials told Texas lawmakers this summer that they were asleep during the early hours of the flooding, and a third was out of town.
Using recordings of first responder communications, weather service warnings, videos of survivors and official testimony, the Associated Press compiled a… Chronology of the chaotic rescue an effort. The AP was one of the media outlets that submitted public information requests for recordings of the 911 calls to be released.
Many people were rescued by boats and emergency vehicles. Some desperate calls came from people floating away in RVs. Some survivors were found in trees and on rooftops.
But some of the calls Friday came from people who didn’t survive, said Kerrville Police Chief Chris McCall, who warned the sound was disturbing.
“The tree I’m on is starting to lean and is going to fall. Is there a helicopter nearby?” Firefighter Bradley Perry calmly told a dispatcher, adding that he saw his wife, Tina, and the RV being swept away.
“I probably have five minutes left,” he said.
Bradley Perry did not survive. His wife was later found clinging to a tree, still alive.
In another heartbreaking call, a woman who lives in a community of riverside cabins told a dispatcher that water was flooding the building.
“We’re having flooding, and we have people in cabins that we can’t reach,” she said. “We’re sinking almost all the way to the top.”
The caller speaks slowly and deliberately. Faint sounds of children’s voices can be heard in the background.
Some people called several times, climbing higher and higher into the houses to let rescuers know where they were and that their situations were becoming more dangerous. Families called from second floors, then attics, then rooftops, sometimes within 30 or 40 minutes, finding out how fast and how high the water was rising.
As daylight came, the volume of calls increased, with people reporting survivors in trees, stuck on roofs, or cars floating in the river.
Brett Eastland, co-director of Camp Mystic, requested search and rescue and called in the National Guard, saying as many as 40 people were missing. “Our power is out. We barely have any cell service,” he said.
911 recordings show that relatives and friends outside the unfolding disaster and those who made it to safety called for help for loved ones trapped in the floods.
One woman said that a friend, an elderly man, was trapped in his house with water up to his head. She realized his phone went off while she was trying to send instructions from the 911 operator.
Inundated with endless calls, dispatchers tried to calm the panicked callers, but they had to move on to the next call. They advised many of those trapped to climb to the roofs of their homes or run to higher ground. In some calls, children can be heard screaming in the background.
“There’s water everywhere, and we can’t move,” said a woman calling from Camp Mystic. “We’re in a room upstairs and the water is rising.”
The same woman called later.
“How do we get to the surface if the water is so high?” I asked. “Can you actually send someone here? With boats?”
I asked the dispatcher when help would arrive.
“I don’t know,” the dispatcher said. “I don’t know.”
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Associated Press reporters Claudia Lauer in Philadelphia; Heather Hollingsworth in Mission, Kansas; Ed White in Detroit; Safia Mystery in Montgomery, Alabama; John Sewer in Toledo, Ohio; Mike Catalini in Trenton, New Jersey, contributed.