I'm feeling slightly judgmental on the Texas flooding and I don't know if my judgment is merited

[conuly]

So, I read an article that said that the flooded cabins at the summer camp were low-lying, about 500 feet from the river. 500 feet is less than a tenth of a mile, so... one or two minutes walk.

And I read another that said that while the dramatic scale of this flooding was unprecedented, the fact that the river floods was very much not.

Am I right to think that at some point since the founding of the camp they ought to have moved the cabins back, put up a flood wall, or both? I live on a hill - if the water a few blocks down floods badly enough to affect us up here, that really will have been unpredictable! So I don't know about living quite that close to water at my front door. Maybe my intuition here is wrong and those precautions could not possibly have occurred to anybody?

Also, two links where you can donate.

Comments

[lilysea]

Apparently one of the factors that caused the deaths was that in 2016, the government opted to not spend money on flood warning sirens and other warning measures, because it preferred to spend the money on roads.

Also, the water at the campsite rose really really fast - 20 feet in 20 minutes.

[conuly]

Given how fast the floods rose, I'm actually not sure any warning system would've been enough to avoid calamity - but I still wonder if moving the cabins further back years ago was something they ought to have done.

[lilysea]

I just looked up Camp Mystic on wikipedia - I was curious if they were for-profit or not-for-profit, because flood walls aren't cheap -

and

"In 1932, the camp suffered a flash flood which washed away several cabins, but no fatalities were reported."

I wonder if the cabins that were washed away in 1932 were rebuilt on higher ground, or rebuilt on the same locations they were washed away from in 1932

[rebeccmeister]

Having lived in Texas, I don't think I could say for certain in this particular case, but in general, Texans have culturally accepted building in flood-prone areas where they really should not build.

This hit a lot of people really hard when Harvey landed in Houston. It's just going to keep happening, and it's tragic.

[conuly]

Well, maybe a big enough tragedy will prompt some sort of legislation banning people from putting residences and sleeping quarters so close to the water on unelevated land. It shouldn't have to take that, but.

[spiralsheep]

We had bans on building at ground level on flood plains over here. Developers built a whole estate of new-build housing on a notorious flood plain (overflow not dry river channel) with only garages at ground level. They got sold to people who couldn't afford better houses elsewhere. The new inhabitants almost all immediately build ground floor extensions.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[conuly]

Jesus.

[fox]

You would think. And yet, Sandy Hook changed nothing. Uvalde changed nothing. Parkland changed nothing.

[rebeccmeister]

It shouldn't, but history does suggest otherwise, sigh.

A couple years ago I listened to a This American Life episode about the climate change concept of managed retreats, but also how people utterly and absolutely refuse to do them. So that's why we'll have even more climate refugees, sigh.

[altamira16]

Clearly, you do not understand the bootstraps you must pull yourself up by because you do not have Texas galaxy brain politics.

There are a lot of good Texans. Unfortunately, they are not in charge of the government.

[adafrog]

There are a lot of good Texans. Unfortunately, they are not in charge of the government.
Word. (I also live in Texas, but in the Panhandle)

"government opted to not spend money"

[disgruntledgirl]

Correct!! (Texan here and heard this on the radio today)
In an August 2016 commissioners court meeting, then Commissioner Buster Baldwin voted against a $50,000 flood engineering study, saying, "I think this whole thing is a little extravagant for Kerr County and I see the word sirens and all that stuff in here."

Lt Gov Dan Patrick - who just spent all of the spring season trying to destroy 8,000 small businesses by banning CBD and THC from the state of Texas (a year after the populace voted to legalize it) threw down chaff and flare by saying "If the city can’t afford it, then the state will step up," - hoping to distract from the FACT that Bill HB 13 had passed the House vote with flying colors and was moved to the Senate for a vote but some reason it died in committee around .... April, when he was in a fervor over THC. The Senate never even looked or voted on it. Patrick neglected to bring attention to it.
HB13 was a bill to improve local disaster warning systems.

Re: "government opted to not spend money"

[conuly]

Well, fucking fuck, and fuck him too.