AUSTIN, TX — Director of the Texas summer camp where 27 campers and counselors were murdered by A Devastating flood 2025 said Monday that he had not seen federal and state early warnings issued the day before the storm struck, and that staff had not held meetings about the impending danger.
Mystic Camp Director Edward Eastland testified at a court hearing about preserving blighted areas of the camp grounds as evidence in several lawsuits filed by victims’ families. July 4 disaster On the banks of the Guadalupe River.
Judge last month The camp was ordered to preserve it Those areas, the camp administrators have appealed. The groups returned to court Monday for more testimony about the camp and what happened there before and during the flood.
This week’s hearing, which could produce the most comprehensive public comment from the operators of the girls’ Christian camp, comes amid their request for a state license to reopen Camp Mystic this summer in a part of campus that was not flooded.
Camp director Edward Eastland testified for several hours Monday in a courtroom packed with families of the girls who were killed.
Eastland said he and other employees signed up for an emergency warning system on their phones and used other weather apps. But he said he did not see social media posts for flood watches by the National Weather Service and the Texas Department of Emergency Management on July 2 and 3.
Eastland said he wasn’t following those agencies on social media and thought the local CodeRED mobile alert system and phone weather app staff at the time “were adequate.”
The National Weather Service’s July 3 alert asked area broadcasters to note that locally heavy rainfall could cause flash flooding in rivers, creeks, creeks and low-lying areas, all features of the Camp Mystic property.
Eastland said his father, Richard Eastland, co-owner of the camp, usually kept an eye out for weather issues. Edward Eastland said he did not believe camp staff had a meeting about alerts and warnings that day.
Storms would hit overnight, killing 25 campers, two teenage counselors, and Richard Eastland.
“We didn’t expect what would happen,” Edward Eastland said.
“You’ve been warned,” said Brad Beckworth, an attorney representing the families who sued Camp Mystic.
Eastland was pressured by the limited information campers and cabin counselors could get because cell phones were not allowed in the cabins, and only some staff carried walkie-talkies to communicate.
The courtroom heard part of a video of “Taps” played over the speakers when the campers went to bed at 10pm on July 3. Those loudspeakers were not used to issue a weather warning, Eastland said.
Eastland said he went to bed around 11 p.m. Eastland said he never received the flash flood warning provided by the National Weather Service at 1:14 a.m., and that he slept through a CodeRED alert text at the same time allotted to his area. The alert warned of flooding that could last for several hours.
His father called him via walkie-talkie just before 2 a.m. to tell him about heavy rain and the need to move canoes and water equipment away from the riverfront. They did not move to evacuate the cabins at the point.
“It didn’t make sense to do that at the time,” Eastland said. “It wasn’t water coming out of the Guadalupe River. It was raining and lighting and the cabins were safe at that time.”
Richard Eastland made the call to evacuate the cabins at about 3 a.m., Edward Eastland said.
Eastland said he never received the flash flood warning provided by the National Weather Service at 1:14 a.m., and that he slept through a CodeRED alert text at the same time allotted to his area. The warning warned of flooding that could last several hours.
Lawyers for the families pressed Eastland to obtain a signed statement from a counselor who woke up during the storm and said she could see girls running for shelter.
“The water was rising faster than anything I had ever seen,” the consultant wrote.
In all, the devastating floods killed at least 136 people along several miles of the river, Raise questions About how things went so wrong.
The families of many of the girls who died He filed a lawsuit against the campground operatorsUnder the pretext that camp officials failed to take the necessary steps to protect the campers as floodwaters approached that threatened their lives.
Efforts to reopen the camp have angered the girls’ families and Texas Gov. Dan Patrick, who said the license should be denied while state lawmakers and agencies investigate. Camp operators said nearly 900 campers had registered to return.
Texas health regulators said last week they were investigating hundreds of complaints against camp owners. The Texas Rangers are also helping look into negligence allegations, according to the Texas Department of Safety, although the scope of the state’s elite investigative unit was not immediately clear.