A man clinging to a tree on the Guadalupe River, shouting for a helicopter to rescue him. A father rushing his family into the attic to escape the relentless floodwaters. A Camp Mystic staff member desperately urging a 911 operator to dispatch aid without delay.
Five months have passed since devastating floods claimed over 100 lives in a particularly affected county in the Texas Hill Country. On Friday, a release of hundreds of 911 call recordings provided fresh insight into the fear and chaos that engulfed the region during the July 4th disaster.
These are the harrowing accounts of those who found themselves at the mercy of the devastating floods in Kerr County:
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At 3:49 a.m., rising waters inundated a home near Highway 39. In a state of panic, a caller was asked by a dispatcher whether he required assistance from police, fire services, or emergency medical teams.
Water was rising in a home near the river on Highway 39 when a dispatcher asked a terrified caller if he needed police, fire or emergency medical services to help him.
“I need everything sir,” the man said. “My house is so flooded. The water is 3 feet (1 meter) up. I’ve got children here. I just need somebody to be aware. I am afraid this is all going to go.”
The dispatcher urged the caller to get as high above the ground level as he can.
“Let’s go,” the man tells his family. “Get in there. Get up there.”
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3:58 a.m.
“We don’t know what to do,” a woman calling from Camp Mystic told a dispatcher as she begged them to send help soon.
The frantic-sounding dispatcher cut her off and said they were fielding “tons of calls about the flooding” and advised the woman to go to the highest point that she could. “We’re working on it as fast as we can,” she said.
The woman calling for help appeared confused.
“There is water everywhere, we cannot move. We are upstairs in a room and the water level is rising,” the woman responded. “If the water will be in our room, what should we do?”
After getting disconnected, the woman called back to repeat her increasingly frantic questions.
“How do we get to the roof if the water is so high?“ she asked.
Asked when help would arrive, the dispatcher responded, “I don’t know. I don’t know.”
Minutes later, sounds of screaming can be heard in the background as an employee at the camp called, telling a dispatcher that a wall had been destroyed. “We need help,” the woman says frantically.
The flood killed 25 girls and two teenage counselors at Camp Mystic, and the owner of the all-girls camp also died.
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4:19 a.m.
A woman who lives about a mile (1.6 kilometers) from Camp Mystic tells a dispatcher that they found campers.
“We’ve already got two little girls who have come down the river,” the woman says. “And we’ve gotten to them but I’m not sure how many others are out there,” she says in a shaky voice.
She says the girls are at her house, and they’re the only ones she’s seen at this point.
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4:22 a.m.
A man tells a dispatcher he’s in a building stuck in a room, with the water almost up to his head.
The dispatcher asks if he can get on top of the building.
“No, I can’t!” the man says frantically. He tells the dispatcher a window is broken and there’s water rushing in. “I’m inside the building. I’m stuck in this room. I can’t get out,” the man yells.
The dispatcher tells him they’re sending people, trying to get them there soon. He leaves the call saying, “The best I can say is to try to keep your head above the water.”
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4:24 a.m.
A woman says she’s trapped in a building at Camp La Junta.
“Help, the building is falling apart. The water is so high. Oh, no. Oh, no,” she says, as she tells the dispatcher her name over and over again.
The dispatcher tells her that help is coming, but they’re having trouble getting to a lot of places because of the water. But they are trying, he says.
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4:31 a.m.
A man calls 911 to report that he and his family are in the attic of a home on Highway 39 but the water is about to overtake the windows.
The dispatcher says there’s not much more she can tell them to do.
A woman interrupts the call: “We’re going to die,” she says through sobs. “I have an infant. She can’t hold her breath. If you come and the water is too high and you say hold your breath, she can’t hold her breath.”
The dispatcher responds: “I understand that but our rescue units are gonna do everything they can.”
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5 a.m.
Bradley Perry, a firefighter, calmy tells a dispatcher that he is stranded in a tree that has started to lean.
“I’m going to die if I don’t get a helicopter. Is it possible?” he asked, explaining: “I’ve probably got maybe five minutes left and I’m dead.”
Perry described seeing his wife, Tina Perry, and their RV washed away. He feared his wife was already dead.
“We’re trying to get people out as soon as we can,” the dispatcher told Perry.
“OK, thank you,” he replied.
Bradley Perry did not survive. His wife was later found clinging to a tree, still alive.
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6:10 a.m.
A woman calls to report that her children are trapped inside an RV trailer. The flooding is so forceful that it had started to carry the trailer away.
“It is moving,” the woman said. “A car that was there is gone.”
The dispatcher assures the woman that she would send help as quickly as possible.
“I need someone here immediately,” the caller said.
Two minutes later, the woman calls back, becoming irate when the dispatcher says that she is sending help “as soon as possible.”
“No. Not as soon as possible. Now!” she says forcefully. She repeats “now” over and over until the call is disconnected.
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Associated Press writers John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas, Jamie Stengle in Dallas and Safiyah Riddle in Montgomery, Alabama, contributed to this report.
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