Rescuers search for over 20 girls from Texas camp as flooding death toll rises to 32

At least 32 people, including 14 children, are dead following torrential rains and flooding in Texas, Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said at a Saturday news conference.

Leitha said that the sheriff's office is trying to figure out who some of the dead people are. Officials are still working to locate the 27 people still missing from Camp Mystic, he added.

The private Christian summer camp is nestled near the Guadalupe River, which surged suddenly on Friday amid relentless rainfall. Officials indicated earlier that everyone at the other 18 or so sites along the river has been found.

On Saturday afternoon, officials indicated that search operations will keep going until everyone who is missing is discovered.

Several girls who are reported missing were in the low-lying cabins on the “Flats,” where junior and intermediate campers live, less than 500 feet from the river bank. Senior campers stay in the nine cabins farther from the river, in a section of the camp called “Senior Hill.”

About 750 girls were attending the camp this week, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick of Texas said at a news conference Friday.

Camp Mystic has been run by the same family over generations since the 1930s, and some of its buildings have been standing since the 1920s. The camp brochure says that the cottages are made of local stone.

About five miles downstream where the two forks of the river converge, the water rose to at least 29 feet on Friday morning, the second-greatest height on record and the highest since the deadly 1987 flood. Ten feet is the start of the flood stage.