People climb over debris on a bridge spanning the Guadalupe River in Ingram, Texas, on Saturday.<\/span>Julio Cortez\/AP<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n On July 4<\/span>, tragedy struck Texas. <\/p>\n A flash flood cresting at more than 20 feet killed<\/a> at least 70 people across six counties in central Texas, according to reports. Most of the damage was concentrated in Kerr County, a region about 125 miles west of Austin. There, the dead include<\/a> 21 children and 11 who reportedly remain missing<\/a> from Camp Mystic, a Christian children\u2019s summer camp in the unincorporated community of Hunt. Videos<\/a> and images show homes destroyed, trees downed, and muddy waters flooding streets.<\/p>\n On Sunday morning, Trump announced<\/a> he had signed a major disaster declaration for Kerr County, which unlocks<\/a> federal funding and resources to support the emergency response and longer-term recovery. Gov. Greg Abbott (R-Texas) has said<\/a> that more than 800 people have been saved so far, but dozens reportedly<\/a> remain missing. <\/p>\n But according to a new report<\/a> in the New York Times<\/em>, there were serious inadequacies in both preparation for and the emergency response to the natural disaster. In part, apparently because of staffing shortages at the National Weather Service (NWS) prompted by Trump\u2019s and Elon Musk\u2019s dismantling of the federal government. Housed within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) at the Department of Commerce, the NWS provides<\/a> forecasts, weather warnings, and climate data that are used to help local and state officials protect communities in the face of weather disasters. Musk\u2019s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)<\/a> invaded NOAA<\/a> earlier this year, and hundreds of forecasters were reportedly fired<\/a>; another 1,000 reportedly<\/a> took buyout offers.<\/p>\n According to the Times<\/em><\/a>, the San Angelo office of the NWS was lacking a senior hydrologist, staff forecaster, and top meteorologist. The nearby San Antonio office also had vacancies for a warning coordination meteorologist and science officer, roles that are designed to work with local officials to plan for floods. The Times<\/em> reports that the warning coordination meteorologist left after taking the early retirement offer that the Trump administration has used across agencies to try to shed staff, citing a\u00a0person with knowledge of that worker\u2019s departure. The Times<\/em> also reports that while some of the open roles may predate the current administration, the current vacancy rates at both the San Antonio and San Angelo NWS offices are roughly double what they were in January, according to Tom Fahy, the legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization, the union that represents NWS employees.<\/p>\n John Sokich, former director of congressional affairs for NWS, told the Times<\/em> the reduced staffing made it harder for the NWS to successfully coordinate with local officials.<\/p>\n On CNN\u2019s State of the Union<\/em> on Sunday, Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) said<\/a> the vacancies should be investigated, adding, \u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s helpful to have missing key personnel from the [NWS] not in place to help prevent these tragedies.\u201d<\/p>\n Rep. @JoaquinCastrotx<\/a> responds to reports that two key Texas National Weather Service offices were understaffed: \u201cI do think that it should be investigated. And I don’t think it’s helpful to have missing key personnel from the National Weather Service not in place to help prevent\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/6wyckCJmZG<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 State of the Union (@CNNSOTU) July 6, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n Several factors, however, contributed to the scale of devastation in Texas, including some that may not have been able to have been anticipated, much less controlled.<\/p>\n Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, said at a news conference on Friday that the NWS underestimated the amount of rain expected to fall in its forecasts, but several meteorologists told<\/a> Wired<\/em> in a report published on Saturday that the meteorologists could not have predicted the severity of this storm, and that their forecasts were accurate at the time they issued them. Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly also told<\/a> reporters, \u201cWe deal with floods on a regular basis\u2026we had no reason to believe that this was going to be anything like what\u2019s happened here.\u201d And as my colleague Henry Carnell points out<\/a> on Bluesky, other factors that were at play included national reductions in FEMA funding and, in some cases, lags in communication<\/a> by local agencies<\/a> to the public advising evacuation.<\/p>\n A spokesperson for NWS said in a statement provided to Mother Jones<\/em> on Sunday that the agency is \u201cheartbroken by the tragic loss of life in Kerr County,\u201d adding that the agency\u2019s local offices in Austin and San Antonio had conducted forecast briefings for emergency management personnel on Thursday, and issued flash floods warnings both Thursday night and Friday morning. <\/strong><\/p>\n Still, the vacancies in the local Texas offices, coupled with the devastation of the floods, point to what experts have said is an urgent need for the Trump administration to bolster resources for emergency responses to natural disasters. Just this week, emergency officials from across the country told CNN <\/a>that FEMA was ghosting them despite the arrival of hurricane season. Also this week, the National Emergency Management Association (NEMA), a nonpartisan group of emergency management directors, sent<\/a> Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem a letter demanding she make congressionally-mandated emergency management grants available immediately, given that they should have been available in May. Spokespeople for DHS and the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Mother Jones<\/em> on Sunday afternoon.<\/p>\n Acting FEMA Director David Richardson reportedly<\/a> told staff last month he was not aware that hurricane season had started, which the White House dismissed as a joke, and a May internal review of FEMA concluded<\/a> that the agency was not ready for hurricane season despite the June 1 deadline. NOAA is also seeking to cut<\/a> another 2,000 employees in its proposed budget for the next fiscal year.<\/p>\n Appearing alongside Noem, who insisted that the Trump administration would upgrade what she described as an \u201cancient\u201d NWS notification system, Abbott pledged at a Saturday press conference that officials \u201cwill be relentless in going after and ensuring that we locate every single person who\u2019s been a victim of this flooding event.\u201d<\/p>\n The tragedy is particularly chilling in light of a May open letter\u00a0issued<\/a>\u00a0by five former NWS directors, who\u00a0wrote that agency\u00a0staff \u201cwill have an impossible task to continue its current level of services\u201d in light of the Trump cuts, adding, \u201cOur worst nightmare is that weather forecast offices will be so understaffed that there will be needless loss of life.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/2025_07_06_mystic-e1751825875541.jpg\")
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