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Update On Deadly Texas Flooding; Escaping The Flood Waters; Official: At Least 43 Dead, Including 15 Children In Texas Floods, Interview With Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX); People In Kerrville Share Their Harrowing Escape Stories. Aired 7-8p ET

Aired July 05, 2025 - 19:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[19:00:00]

LARRY LEITHA, KERR COUNTY SHERIFF: We continue to have hundreds of first responders on the ground water in this search and rescue process. We rescue process. We have a lot of people here. We got a lot of help. We're very fortunate. Here's some new updated numbers for you all.

As of 5:30, we have recovered 43 deceased individuals in Kerr County. Among these who are deceased, we have 28 adults and 15 children. 12 adults pending identification, and 5 children are pending identification at this time. Our missing persons call center is open to those reporting missing loved ones. The phone number is 830-258- 1111. Repeating, 830-258-1111.

We also are accepting these reports via email at floodrecovery@co.kerr.tx.us. Repeating, floodrecovery@co.kerr.tx.us. Please provide the last known location identifying information if possible. We appreciate the assistance we're receiving from all levels of government from local agencies to state and federal agencies responding.

I tell you, the governor has assured us along with the federal government that we will have all the resources we need. And we do have that. We've got all the resources we need. We're in really good shape to keep going for several more days.

I want to tell you all something, I appreciate you all cooperation. We will try to get you as much updated information as we can starting tomorrow at 10:00 and 3:00 o'. Clock. Once again, as your Kerr County sheriff, I assure you we're going to do everything along with our partners, and we'll be on this till we find the last body.

At this time, I'm going to turn it over to our City Manager, Dalton Rice.

DALTON RICE, KERRVILLE CITY MANAGER: Thank you, Sheriff. Good evening. Dalton Rice, the city manager for City of Kerrville. Mayor Herring wanted me to just give a message. He's out with, you know, with the teams. He's kind of checking on everybody. Just like everybody else, we all need to take, you know, downtime to include you all. So make sure, you know you all are taking care of yourselves as well. We're in a marathon and we got to make sure we always think about that and look after each other.

So a couple updates. Since 6:00 a.m. this morning, we've had a combined primary clear, so aerial and ground of about 100 meter distance on either side of the Guadalupe River from 1 mile north of Camp Mystic up through Hunt and Ingram. So we talked about that briefly this morning. Excuse me.

We talked about that briefly this morning. So 100 meters on each side. They are continuing operations on that. We are also working on operations within the City of Kerrville as well again along the river banks. As you know, since the waters have resided some.

We are working on, again we talked about downtime. We are working on locations for first responders to make sure that do have, you know, their adequate downtime and the rest. We're constantly going through kind of shift management cycles to make sure that our first responders and our crews and teams are taken care of.

Public works. So, water is looking good. We've identified some leaks. We've been able to shut those leaks down or isolate those leaks. We will be likely operating off of well water probably for the next foreseeable, about four weeks is what we're projecting. So, we're no longer -- we're not going to be pulling surface water for about four weeks.

With these type of events, there's a lot of debris, there's a lot of chemicals, a lot of gasoline, a lot of other contaminants that are in there. We are working with TCEQ and other partners in there to make sure that we get these issues addressed as quickly as possible.

We get a lot of information for people who are wanting help. Excuse me. A lot of people who are wanting information to help. Best thing you can do, especially right in your small local area. Don't go out into major areas. Public works mentioned. Just, hey, pick up a little bit of debris in your trash cans or your trash bags. You know, keep it local, but stay out of the major areas. You know, everything is still, you know, very dangerous, very hazardous conditions.

Let me pull up our KPUB utility report. Of course, it went away. So KPUB still has approximately 600 customers that are without power. The largest remain outage customers are west of Ingram, south of 39 along South Fork of Hunt. KPUB issued a mutual aid request on July 4th. 50 personnel and utilities, and contractors from across Texas are coming in to support operations and restoration.

[19:05:10]

Hunt or South Fork sustained extensive storm related damage including approximately 40 downed power poles with widespread tree and flood debris, heavily damaged infrastructure. Restoration in these remaining areas will be lengthy and complex and customers should prepare for multi day outages. Customers outside of these remaining areas still experience an outage should report it to KPUB by calling KPUB's outage line at 855-959-2496. But power has been restored to most of the other customers. Like I said, about 600 are still remaining. A lot of the county is also on Aqua Texas or private wells. We try to

get information on that, but we don't have a lot of information as far as private wells are concerned or the status of Aqua Texas.

But a big bulk of what we had within coming through the Guadalupe is within the city limits, which is on the city limit, you know, or city water supply. Aqua Texas and some of those other public water systems are typically outside of what we're thinking is the damage area. But we have not had any reports from Aqua Texas on outages.

And with that we will take a couple questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible) the recovery in -- for some of the recovery bodies in the (inaudible) park. And the other part of the question is, how many red tag buildings are now on the river that the Kerrville Fire Department has issued.

RICE: Yes, so when you talk about red tag, you're talking about like condemned buildings. Obviously out here the damage is extensive. Right now, we're really focused on life safety. We are searching on, focused on search and rescue. Search and rescue is the priority.

So we're not really red tagging buildings. Now, we do have structural teams come out. They will mark stuff. You'll see spray paint. A lot of that is to identify where we've at least primary searched. But we are not going into the structural side of things unless it poses a risk to first responders.

Our primary focus is on search and rescue of every single person involved, and we'll continue through the night to make sure that happens. Yes, real quick we are finding bodies and stuff. We knew today was going to be that day. So our numbers are going to constantly be changing. We are constantly working on identification and working with our local partners to ensure that we bring in all the resources so we can make sure that we partner with folks.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What is the communication procedure for letting camps and other places on the river know when to evacuate and (inaudible)?

RICE: So each camp is obviously a, you know, mostly private or they have different ownerships and so on these, on especially in this situation. So. Well, let's talk about this one more specifically. The event happened very fast, you know, rose over 20ft, 30ft within less than, you know, a two-hour time span on a holiday in the morning, there wasn't a lot of time in this case. You know, as far as warnings, obviously, there's a lot of things going around. We want to make sure that we focus on the early level.

Regardless of the warning side of things, again, we want to make sure that we take care of our local community and focus on search and rescue operations. So, please keep that question.

We definitely want to, you know, get these addressed but right now we want to focus on getting everybody that we possibly can out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Has that number of the Camp Mystic campers at 27 changed?

RICE: As of right now, I do not think it has changed. It is still 27. Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you know how many people you guys are searching for as of right now, or is there no cap on that? So right now, there's -- we're kind of looking at this in two ways. Call it the known missing, which is the 27, you know, camp kids that are missing. We will not put a number on the other side because we just don't know. Campers are coming in for 4th of July weekend.

People are camped along the riverbank. People are coming in to visit. There's a number that we just don't know yet, and we don't know what we don't know. So as things are starting to develop and as things are starting to move along, we're not going to put a cap on this. We are just going to continue until we find everything else. One more question.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We know there are many children missing. Are there any --

RICE: Let me give it to somebody else.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just one question about current rescues. Can you give us a sense about how often you're seeing a rescue, and just in terms of kind of like for example when your last rescue was.

RICE: So you know, with, obviously with the camps, we've been rescuing people out of these camps by the hundreds, you know, all day. So there's a lot of folks that are shelter in place. So we leave them in place to make sure that we get them food, water. And some of these camps actually now are self-rescuing, if you will. Maybe that's not the right word, but they are self extricating, if you will.

So they're getting waters down. They're getting their own resources. They're not having to tie up local and state resources. We are monitoring them, but they're accounting for their own folks. So that has been going on, obviously, for over 800 plus people. And we're continuing to do that so. Good.

[19:10:13]

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you. Sorry, one more question. I can absolutely appreciate that right now the focus is finding the missing. It's very active search and rescue. But what do you say to the parents that are in grief, understandably frustrated as to how in the world this could happen? How in the world you could have so many campers in the way of this danger and not taken out of it?

RICE: Yes, you know, that's the question over the hour. But you know, with these, this is last time it was this bad, and this one is even worse than that was 1987. You can't predict it.

Everybody in the media even knows everybody who does this and sees this every single day. You have the inverse effect of if you continue to push it, and you see this in Houston areas all the time, you cry wolf. What happens when you continue to, you know, ramp things up and you continue to put a lot of information out there? You know, again, not to, you know, harp on the media, but there's a lot of stuff that gets over spun up and we see that way too often, and then that cut trickles down. So we did look at stuff.

Obviously, I had told the story. I was out on the river trail at you know, 3:30. I left about 4:00 o'clock. We did not see any signs of the river rising, and by 5:20, we almost weren't able to get out of the park on the upper end. It rose that quickly.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So was it a massive or (inaudible) so quickly and this was a massive tragedy. People are more (inaudible).

RICE: No. This was a massive tragedy. Hands down. We are hitting from our again flood maps. We're seeing some areas where it's hitting the 100-year flood thing. And again, we talked about the North and South Fork. That water hit perfectly.

You heard Chief Nim Kidd talk a little bit about, you know, the wide area. This went from San Angelo to Waco and all they stage where they can, but you do not know what's going to happen. One, until water falls, and two, the predictions were definitely off. That water and rain fell almost double of what was anticipated both in the North and South Fork, and converged into one place, and it rose that quick. So, thank you.

ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: So you're just listening there to the that who the man who was just speaking there was the city manager for Kerrville, Dalton Rice. We also heard briefly from the Kerr County Sheriff. I just want to update you on some of the numbers that we have from them because the death toll in terms of bodies that have been recovered has now risen.

We know at least 43 people dead, 43 bodies have been discovered, 43 deceased. Among them those are 28 adults, 15 children. Of those 43, you have 17 who have not yet been identified, 12 adults and five children. The missing persons center is still open and they're urging everybody to call in.

There are a lot of questions as well about some of the other numbers that we've been about. We're talking a lot about the number of campers who are missing. So the city manager just confirming there that there are still 27 campers from Camp Mystic who are missing. Those 27 children, as we understand it. So we'll stay on top of that, obviously.

And he did warn that these numbers will constantly be changing, of course, as these search and rescue efforts continue. He said the damage is extensive, but again, the focus right now is on finding survivors, not necessarily on looking at condemning buildings. He was asked about that, but said only when those building are really posing a threat to the safety of these first responders will they mark them. Otherwise, they are moving on again trying to find survivors.

In terms of the known missing, again, he did. The only number he would confirm are the 27 campers. He said in terms of the larger number of people who are maybe missing, in his words, we just don't know what we don't know. He does not want to put a number on that because there are so many questions, so many camping areas, of course, not just the camp, the children's camps that were there, but camping areas, of course, along the river, a number of people there for the holidays. And he concluded by just saying this was a massive tragedy, noting, you just never know what's going to happen until the water falls. Said some of the predictions were off, but again, calling it a massive tragedy.

Our CNN teams are standing by. We have Ed Lavandera, who's there at Camp Mystic. Ed, I'm not sure how much of that you were able to hear, but the city manager, you know, very clear, obviously in terms of how those numbers are expected to rise and likely not surprising given the damage that is behind you and that of course, you have seen over the last several hours.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's true. And we're now approaching, I think, what, close now to 36 hours since the brunt of this storm washed through here and the camp, and the fact that there's still 27 young campers from Camp Mystic, and that's the area that you see behind me that they're still missing. With every hour that's passing by, that does not bode well. And that news sends shockwaves across the state because these are young people and families who send their kids here from all over, families from Austin and Dallas and Fort Worth, and Houston who have flocked here to get the word.

[19:15:10]

And I can assure you that there is a great deal of attention being paid on every little detail that emerges on what is happening with the search with those girls. But you know, Erica, the grounds here, very quiet now.

We've seen emergency vehicles racing by several times. It's hard to make out exactly what they're racing to or if they're what kind of call race interiors. We're trying to keep tabs on that, but there's kind of cleanup and recovery efforts going on at the campground behind you. Those cabins that you see there in the distance, those are some of the -- this is called the flats area of Camp Mystic. And that is where the youngest campers were.

And I've spoken with a parent and a counselor who had children in those cabins, and they described the heroic efforts by some of the counselors to break out windows on the backside of the of those cabins to get kids out of the flood waters. And there was nowhere for them to go except up that hill. And that is not a hill where the campers would normally hike through. There's no carved-out trails or anything like that. That is very rocky, difficult terrain to make their way up through.

So you imagine these young children doing that, being led by a couple of older teenage counselors, and they're doing this in pouring rain, thunder, lightning, as this swell of floodwaters is wreaking havoc all around them. A truly traumatizing experience for these young children.

HILL: Yes, it absolutely was, Ed. Appreciate it as always. It's good to have you there on the ground.

I also want to bring in Marybel Gonzalez, who is ingram, Texas at this hour at that Reunification Center. Ingram, of course, was also mentioned in this press conference there. There is so much talk about the residual utility issues as well, power that is out, water concerns. And at the space behind you there, which was initially the Reunification Center. I know you've been talking to people going in and out there, dropping off supplies to try to help with all that is needed in this moment. Marybel?

MARYBEL GONZALEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I think that, first and foremost, there is a sense of urgency. First and foremost it is to find everybody who is unaccounted for, everyone who is missing following this flash flooding. But there's also another sense of urgency, and that is to address the community's needs. And we've seen a stream of cars coming in and out of the Ingraham Elementary School. It was a Reunification center yesterday, and this is where we saw dozens of families gathering and lining up outside, desperately trying to find their missing loved ones, including children that were reunited with their families here.

But today we are seeing just the community coming together, bringing things like diapers, bringing things like water, bringing things like cleaning supplies, anything that one may need during a disaster. We even, just moments ago saw small children donating their toys. So it is definitely a powerful to see that here.

And while here there isn't any visible damage, at least not where we're standing at this elementary school. We were just 3-minute drive away in Kerrville, Texas, before coming live on here. We went to an RV park, the Blue Oak RV Park. We spoke to that property owner. She says almost all of the RVs on her property washed away.

Some people were able to get out in time, but she said five people in that RV park washed away. She doesn't know what happened to them, if they were found downstream, or if they're still missing and the people are still looking for them. So and that's only minutes from here. So the situation is very dire. We saw it for ourselves. We saw downed trees.

We saw that river just destroying everything around it. So it is very devastating. And people here are recognizing that. They're taking these supplies to areas like that and also to Hunt, Texas. They're trying to bring them closer to where those that camp is and where we know so many people were there vacationing for the Fourth of July holiday. So they're trying to take these donations to at least try to help them get through while they're searching for their loved ones.

HILL: Absolutely. Marybel Gonzalez in Ingram for us at this hour. Thank you.

Still ahead here in the CNN Newsroom, more stories of people responding in those moments, one man who along with more than a dozen others barely escaped the deadly floodwaters. That story just ahead. Stay with us here in the CNN Newsroom.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:24:07]

HILL: We are, of course, following the breaking news out of Texas this evening. Rescue efforts underway in central Texas after the deadly flash floods that swept through parts of the state. Officials now say in just the last few moments, updating the number to 43 dead at this hour, including 15 children whose bodies have been recovered, a number of them actually still not identified.

Ricky Gonzalez was in the area for a birthday with a number of other friends and family there. When you and your family, as I understand it, Ricky, you ended up running for your life. So there's 13 of you there. You're there. It's a holiday weekend. You're there for a birthday along with five dogs, thankfully, because as I understand it, one of those dogs really played a role in us speaking right now.

Walk me through what happened and just how quickly it all happened.

RICKY GONZALEZ, KERRVILLE FLOOD SURVIVOR: Yes. So a big group of us from Houston, we decided to what we wanted to have a celebratory weekend celebrating a friend's birthday and celebrating Fourth of July. We get to the Airbnb Thursday night, you know, excited to go fishing and swimming. Early Friday morning, around 6:00 o'clock in the morning, one of our dogs, Nash, was pawing at the door and woke up one of my friends.

[19:25:16]

And when he woke up, he happened to look out the window and noticed that one of our vehicles were drifting away in the river. And that's when we all kind of woke up and looked outside. And I was in shock.

I turned, just didn't know what to do. I kept hearing a big banging and come to find out, one of my friends trucks was lodged underneath the second floor of the house, hitting the pillars. And so, we were just trying to figure what we needed to do, stay calm, make sure everyone was safe. We started blowing up floaties that we had for the pool, air mattresses, just to find something that could keep us afloat. I was scared that the house was going to either fall from the stilts or the water was going to raise.

The water just kept raising on the steps, going higher and higher. And I started calling my sister, I guess, just to let her know, maybe say my final goodbye, because it really was that scary. The water was going very quickly, and you can see the river just engulfing everything. The house next to us was floating away. All four of our (inaudible).

HILL: You saw the house?

GONZALEZ: It was gone. When went to bed, it was there. When I woke up, it was gone.

HILL: Oh, my goodness. And was that house you mentioned, the house you were staying in was on stilts? How high was it? Was it one story up essentially?

GONZALEZ: It was two stories, so one story up. So it was maybe six inches away from the door of the second story.

HILL: Oh, my goodness. And so you're -- go ahead.

GONZALEZ: The river was maybe about 100 yards away from the house. So I was expecting to go to the river for this trip. I wasn't expecting the river to necessarily come to us. So it's very scary.

HILL: Yes. Absolutely not. We're looking at some of the pictures that you sent us here. We can see just how close and how quickly that water is moving, too. So, a house next to you is gone. You're seeing one of your cars float away, the truck, you know, up against the house. How did you get out? How were you all? How did you manage to save yourselves?

GONZALEZ: So during that time, I was on FaceTime with my sister, and I just so happened to look out the window and was showing her one of the concrete fences that fell from the river. And we just happened to see someone driving by further down on the street who was checking one of their properties. And I waved, and she kind of came around, and she was accessing the house, and from the outside later we found out it was in worse condition than we thought.

So her and her family, they were able safely get us out, all 13 of us, including the five dogs, this family, the Garcia family, Leo and Paula, they took us in, they put us in the back of the trucks. They took us to their home. They fed us homemade breakfast. They made sure were dry. Very accommodating and sweet.

I mean, just heaven-sent. And they even offered to take four of us to the San Antonio airport so we can rent vehicles so we can get back to Houston. So they did that. They took us back to the house to get all of our belongings once the water subsided. And as a thank you, we just gave all the food and everything that we bought for the weekend, barbecue fajitas, and we gave it to them. And this family, just literally, they're taking it back to donate to the first response.

So just a family with open heart. And it's, you know, in this time, disasters, unfortunately, you know, we're from Houston, so we get a lot of flooding and things happen. But it's really nice to see that people still lead with an open heart and are willing to help complete strangers like us.

So between Nash the dog waking us up and the Garcia family, they really helped us out. And they have a small business called Tea Time Trailer, I believe in Kerrville. And they just seem like really great people. So we were forever indebted for them because they really did save us.

HILL: Yes. You are forever linked to them, your guardian angels in many ways. Ricky, I am so happy to be able to speak with you, to know that you and your friends and the dogs are all okay. And what a gift from the Garcias. And yes, you will be forever linked. Thank you so much for your time. GONZALEZ: Thank you so much. Thank you.

HILL: President Trump, for his part, promising to honor the federal disaster declaration signed just a short time ago by Texas Governor Greg Abbott in the wake of the deadly flooding in his state. We'll take a closer look at what that federal aid could mean for the state when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[19:33:41]

HILL: We are continuing to follow the breaking news out of Texas. At this hour, first responders looking for the missing after those flash floods devastated central parts of the state. Officials at this hour, just a short time ago, updating that at least 43 people have died. They have recovered 43 bodies, including 15 children.

The Trump administration says it is sending federal resources to help with the local and state response. CNN's Betsy Klein joins us now. So, what more do we know, Betsy, about the federal response that will be there? We already know some is there on the ground, but what else may be coming to help in Texas?

BETSY KLEIN, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Right, well, Erica, one of these local officials, in the last hour at a news conference said that this is going to be a marathon and it is close coordination between state, local, and federal officials really driving this forward. On the federal side, what we know is that FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, has been activated along with the U.S. Coast Guard, which has been assisting in search and rescue.

Secretary Kristi Noem, the Homeland Security Secretary, said that she has requested additional fixed wing aircraft with thermal imaging. Now, what that means is once it starts to get dark in the next couple of hours or so, those search and rescue and recovery efforts can continue with those -- that type of technology. Additionally, the Army Corps of Engineers is on site, as well as U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which has sent Border Patrol agents to the area to help bolster those resources.

[19:35:16]

But this is going to be a very long search and rescue and recovery effort. More federal aid is needed. And Governor Greg Abbott of Texas has requested the President sign a Federal Disaster Declaration for Texas. Noem indicated that President Trump would be signing that. We've reached out to the White House for any guidance on whether the President has signed that and what time it might be happening, but Noem said that she has spoken with Trump several times today.

She said she is heading to Camp Mystic, where of course, 27 girls campers still remain missing at this hour. We still don't know the full extent of federal resources that are going to be needed. This is going to be a very lengthy process, and we don't know whether Congress will need to approve relief funding. We also know that Congressman August Pfluger, who represents Texas Hill Country, announced in a post to social media that two of his daughters were at Camp Mystic and they have been reunited with the family. He said please join us as we pray for miracles, of course, we are doing that.

Two other points I want to note. Number one, the President has been deeply critical of FEMA. He says he plans to phase out that agency at the end of this hurricane season. And second, going forward, the President's budget for fiscal year 2026, which they are already starting to implement, does make cuts and even closes. Some of these weather research labs that are so critical for forecasting. They really give that data that we need for better forecasts. The tools that they use to collect that data are now experiencing cuts.

DOGE, the Department Of Government Efficiency also cut hundreds of employees at NOAA, which is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, as well as the National Weather Service. It's really too soon to know at this stage whether this had any sort of impact on this notification effort. But Secretary Noem was pressed on the alerts from the National Weather Center. Here's how she defended the administration.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KRISTI NOEM, U.S. HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: That is something and one of the reasons that when President Trump took office that he said he wanted to fix and his currently upgrading the technology and the National Weather Service has indicated that with that and NOAA, that we needed to renew this ancient system that has been left in place with the federal government for many, many years. But I do carry your concerns back to the federal government, to President Trump and we will do all we can to fix those kinds of things that that may have felt like a failure to you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KLEIN: Now, the storm that created the conditions for this flash flooding was completely unpredictable, truly unprecedented. Senator Cornyn of Texas said that the river rose 26ft in 45 minutes. So, really just unimaginably quickly, 43 people are dead, which includes 15 children and of course, two dozen campers continue to be missing -- Erica.

HILL: Yes, absolutely. Betsy, appreciate the updates, thank you.

Also with us this hour, Republican Congressman Tony Gonzales from Texas, his district borders the region where this flooding emergency, of course, is ongoing. Congressman, appreciate you joining us. You also know the area very well. You were telling me when we spoke briefly in the break, you grew up about an hour away. What are you hearing from folks that you've spoken with on the ground and what do they need at this hour?

REP. TONY GONZALES (R-TX): Yes, thank you for having me, Erica, on. We're absolutely heartbroken here in Texas anytime you lose a life, but especially an innocent child. It just -- it rips at the fabric of your community. I know that very well. I represent Uvalde, we know what happened several years ago when many innocent children lost their lives.

It's the basic things, anytime something like this happens, it's, you know, you have a lot of people from outside of the community that surge and respond to it. But it's the little things like, where are they going to sleep? You know, they need they need cots, you know, what are they going to drink? Are they going to, you know, where are they going to shower? I mean, it's just those little type of things that are needed at this hour. And it's some basic things too, like communications.

This is something that we saw after these tragedies is how do you just the basic function to be able to communicate, time is our greatest threat right now. Every hour that goes by is an hour more that the people are missing are, you know, are fighting for their lives.

HILL: Your fellow congressman from the State of Texas, Congressman Pfluger, noting that he had been reunited with his daughters who were at Camp Mystic. I'm not sure if you've been in touch with him at all.

GONZALES: I have, I have, and this is this is the thing, Erica, I mean, my mother was born in Kerrville. I mean, Texas is a big place, but it's a small place, like we are all connected in a very, very unique way. And this area in particular, a lot of people go there to visit and have stories there.

You know, what has happened is for the last several years, Texas has been under this long drought. So, over the last several weeks, we've gotten a whole lot of rain. Just here in San Antonio. a few weeks ago, we had 13 people that that drowned because of these flash floods. And when the flash flood hits, it hits at lightning speed. And it's very, very unpredictable. So sadly, there's so many of us that have a story or a connection to this area.

[19:40:37]

HILL: Yes, absolutely. There was also, you know, I've heard from a number of people today and I know you, you recall this as well. There were similar floods, though not nearly to this degree, but devastating in 1987. I mean, how often was something like that talked about? Was it a concern over the last, you know, several years that something like what happened then could happen, certainly like what we just saw in the last two days ago?

GONZALES: You know, because we were in this drought for so long, just the sight of rain itself was kind of unique, right? So, to go from not having any rain to all of a sudden you're getting, you know, inches upon inches of rain was really unexpected. And I think back to 1987, you know, I was seven years old, I was a small child. We lived out in the country, and there was a bridge that we had to take in order to get to Camp Wood, which is a small little town. And I remember driving there and the bridge was completely washed away.

You know, we had to wait a week plus before they rebuilt it. We were kind of on our own. A lot of people in this community are kind of in the same boat. You know, they've been through some of these tough, tough times. But we had -- we had almost forgotten, right. We, like I said, we weren't even getting rain. Now is the time where you really you need a surge resources to it. Make sure it's all hands on deck. And like I said, it's not just this community. Everybody has a connection in one form or another to some of the people that have been lost.

HILL: Yes, I will say, you know, on the upside, what we are hearing from so many local and state officials is that they really are getting what they need in this moment. You know, we heard just a short time ago in our in the most recent at the top of the hour, the most recent update that we had, the Kerr County sheriff saying, we do have in this moment all the resources we need. But how appreciative he was of the resources coming in state, federal.

He also stressed, or officials, I should say, that the city manager stressing for Kerrville, this is really a marathon and that I think sometimes can get lost is what comes after the recovery, the rebuilding. There are potentially years, years ahead for this community of just the physical rebuilding, not to mention the emotional.

As you noted, you represent a community that has dealt with intense tragedy and coming together to wrap your arms around one another to get through it. But it is also the help and the hope that comes from outside that can also help lift people up in times of tragedy. Just talk to me about how important, if you would, that has been for Uvalde.

GONZALES: Yes, you're exactly right. And two things come to mind: One, is we are not out of the woods yet. I mean, we've had flash flood warnings all day long today. And so, there are more communities that are getting impacted. There are more communities essentially where the where the ground has been saturated and more and more people are under threat.

So one, we are not out of the woods yet. And this may expand to other areas as well. So, that's what I worry. You know, you kind of have a lot of resources in one part of the area. Very, very, very rightfully so but as other communities fall under attack, too. You've have to make sure that they get things. And then long term, I mean, that's the real difficult part, the healing process, when you lose, you know, an innocent child or just innocent people in general, it really tears at you.

And that's where it's so important that we have a long-term sustainability not only from the federal government, which is appreciated, but really as Texans coming together and making sure that we are taking care of our state and helping the folks rebuild their lives, pick up the scraps and, you know, pick up the pieces that they've lost and essentially go, what's next?

And these stories, when you have neighbors coming together, especially in this political time, there's so much division, there's so much anger. You know, when a natural disaster hits, the beautiful stories where you just -- you're just helping people and there's so many of those that I think are important. Thank you for sharing a lot of those stories. That's the first step in the rebuilding and the healing process.

HILL: Yes, absolutely. Congressman, I appreciate you taking the time to join us tonight, thank you.

GONZALES: Of course, thank you.

HILL: And we'll be right back. Stay with us.

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[19:49:24]

HILL: As we continue to follow the rescue efforts out of Central Texas, where at least 43 people now have now been declared dead, including 15 children in the wake of that flash flooding. There are also questions about the conditions that led to this point.

Again, those rescue and recovery operations are ongoing. Meteorologist Chris Warren is with us live. So, we've been talking a little bit about rain to come, but there are also questions about how this came on so quickly. Flash floods, as we know, have the name flash flooding because it's so fast. But there were ground conditions in the area too that also led to this devastating outcome that we saw. Walk us through what was happening.

[19:50:01]

CHRIS WARREN, AIMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, and Congressman Gonzales mentioned that talking about how rare it was just to even see rain. And it's somewhat counterintuitive, you would think, if it's really dry, then there's a lot of room maybe in the soil for the rain to, you know, come in, be taken in like a dry sponge, right, it should take in a lot of water.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. You may notice this during a dry period in your lawn. It can get hard, right? It's essentially like its baked. So, we're dealing with a drought and you see the categories here abnormally dry and yellow where the flood happened, it was exceptional.

So on the far end, the most intense type of drought. So, the earth has been baked here and its hard. So, it takes a while for it to loosen up and soften up and when the amount of rain, like we saw falls in a matter of hours just over two days more than a foot of rain in many areas, this was more rain than you would expect all summer long.

So, when this falls and again, a lot of this happening in a matter of hours as the radar recap shows us Friday overnight, during the overnight hours, again, about 12 hours' worth of rain. When all of that falls, on that hard ground, initially it's just going to run off and this type of rain, the land was absolutely not doing us any favors.

HILL: Yes, absolutely. It's so important, though, to have you explain that and have you walk us through it. Chris, appreciate it, thank you.

Stay tuned, our coverage continues on the other side of this quick break.

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[19:56:00]

HILL: We are starting to see so much more of the devastation left behind by the floods and in Kerrville and Texas Hill Country. A number of buildings just gone, homes swept away. And of course, the question is whether anybody was home at the time, what may have happened in those buildings, as we look at some of these pictures.

Sarah Acosta, reporter with CNN, Antonio -- CNN's San Antonio affiliate, KSAT, has a closer look from the ground here.

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SARAH ACOSTA, KSAT REPORTER (voice over): This home floated about the length of a football field down the Guadalupe River when the flash flood rose quickly into the homes on Waterfront Drive in Kerrville, along Bandera Highway and Loop 534.

ACOSTA (on camera): And this is what's left of that home, completely leveled by the river behind it. And the neighbors tell us they fear that the people who lived here may have not survived. And we spoke with the people who live next door, and they walked us through what happened.

SCOTT WALDEN, NEIGHBORS' HOUSE SWEPT AWAY: I had no idea that something like this could happen and then, holy (bleep) stuff started to hit the walls and my wife jumped up and looked out the back porch and it was a river.

ACOSTA (voice over): Scott Walden and his wife say the water came in so fast there was no time to evacuate.

WALDEN: By the time I went to get my keys to move my truck out of the way to just back up across the street, the water had risen and flooded my truck. The water got up there in the door about this high, and I looked at my wife and it was like, we need to get out of here.

ACOSTA (voice over): That water too strong and fast, sweeping them down the river.

WALDEN: We went ahead and jumped out and we got washed down three houses and we finally ended up snagged on a on a big bush. So, we hung onto the bush until we got rescued.

ACOSTA (voice over): They hung onto a crape myrtle tree for about 30 minutes before they were rescued by police officers, who formed a human chain.

WALDEN: We were kind of going, we hope this isn't it.

ACOSTA (voice over): Walden says they are grateful to be alive, saying his destroyed home and cars are just material things.

WALDEN: This is just stuff.

ACOSTA (voice over): Neighbor, Irma Cantu, says they live a couple of houses over fortunate their home is safe and they were able to evacuate quick enough, feeling overwhelmed.

IRMA CANTU, NEIGHBOR'S HOUSE SWEPT AWAY: A feeling of sadness. Because, I mean. Even the people that were here weren't expecting this to happen.

ACOSTA (voice over): As they pick up the pieces and continue to look for neighbors and loved ones, she hopes it's a time where the community can stand strong.

CANTU: Helping each other is -- this is when we need to come together and help each other out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HILL: And our thanks again to Sarah Acosta for that report.

Well, Texas officials have now said at least 43 people are confirmed dead, including 15 children. We have the very latest for you just ahead, right here, stay with us here in the CNN NEWSROOM.

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