They Said No One Could Have Known
But we've heard that before, again and again.
Thinking of everyone in Hill Country. Sending prayers, love, and strength.
Much of the last 24-hours, like many of you across Texas, I spent glued to the news, devastated by unimaginable horrors. As of writing this, 27 confirmed dead, over 100 still missing, including 23 to 25 young girls from Camp Mystic.
To help First Responders and local governments in their recovery efforts, you can donate to the Kerr County Flood Relief Fund.
While rescue efforts continue in Kerr County, two were killed and ten others are now missing from flash flooding in Travis County. Williamson County has also issued a disaster declaration and conducted multiple rescues this morning.
Less than three weeks ago, 13 people lost their lives in flash flooding in San Antonio.
Today, the finger-pointing has already started.
Especially from our side. “It was DOGE.” “It was the cuts to the NOAA,” blaming these as the reason why these camps and RV Parks were not warned and evacuated.
Don’t do that.
Perhaps it was the cuts, maybe it wasn’t, but a thorough investigation is needed to determine the root cause of what went wrong before we make assumptions.
, a Texas-based weather reporter, claims that there is no evidence that NOAA or NWS budget or staffing cuts played a role in this specific event. He further explains that the central failure appears to be in how warnings were received, rather than whether they were issued.I expect that the Legislature will include an investigation into what went wrong in this situation in their special session next month. We determine what went wrong and figure out how to rectify the issue. If incompetence is to blame, expect to see the families launch massive lawsuits against those responsible.
And be prepared that the blame game might not only come from our side. We’ve already seen the Kerr County Judge and the State Government blaming the Federal Government. And maybe they are to blame, but we wait for the facts.
“We get floods all the time, but we had no reason to believe it was going to be anything like this.”
That’s what Rob Kelly, Kerr County Judge, said yesterday in a press conference, and a sentiment I’ve heard repeated again and again over the last 24-hours. No one could have seen this coming, no one could have expected it.
It’s almost the same thing we heard last year in the Smokehouse Creek Fire, or the Houston Drecho, or Winter Storm Uri. An act of God every year? Or maybe we have been warned.
Public Citizen: Climate Change in Texas
Texas A&M: Texans Should Prepare For Hotter Temperatures, Greater Risk Of Fire And Flooding
Texas Tribune: Texas weather extremes likely to become normal, scientists say
Warmer climate fuels more powerful storms. Prolonged dry conditions meant local soils couldn’t absorb intense rainfall, driving quick runoff into rivers and channels. A perfect setup for sudden “flash flood emergencies.” Texas has experienced an upward trend in both droughts and intense storms in recent years. This pattern aligns with climate model projections, indicating an increase in extreme summer rain events.
It wasn’t an act of God. It’s our society’s reliance on fossil fuels and our politicians’ refusal (especially Republicans) to move us in another direction. And climate scientists have been warning us for decades that these are the repercussions.
Climate change is not a distant threat. It is killing people in Texas. Not metaphorically. Literally. In fires, in floods, in storms, in unbearable heat. It’s about children swept away in Hill Country rivers. It’s about families who never make it out of trailer parks, or who drown while waiting for help that never came.
And it will keep happening. Again and again. Because the storms are getting stronger. The heat is getting hotter. The dry spells are longer, and the rains are more violent. Climate change is accelerating. And Texas is standing still.
We are governed by leaders who downplay the science, deflect the blame, and refuse to plan. They cut funding for preparedness. They mock renewables. They call it an “act of God” because it’s easier than saying the truth aloud. We knew this was coming, and we did nothing.
There is no excuse left. The cost of delay is human life. And the longer we pretend otherwise, the more we will bury.
The climate is changing, and Texas isn’t ready.
Flash floods are becoming routine. Camps built too close to rivers, RV parks situated in flood zones, and neighborhoods with no evacuation routes. These aren’t freak accidents anymore. They are structural vulnerabilities in a world that’s getting hotter, wetter, and more volatile by the year.
We talk about resilience, but we haven’t built it. Not in our zoning laws. Not in our emergency systems. Not in our public infrastructure or our political imagination. We rebuild the same way, in the same place, with the same risks, and then act shocked when it happens again.
Texas must reckon with what it means to live in a flood-prone, heat-stricken, wildfire-exposed state, and that begins with asking hard questions:
Why are our warning systems failing the people who need them most?
Why aren’t we funding proactive climate adaptation, elevated housing, riverbank buyouts, and predictive mapping?
Why are we still building in harm’s way?
This isn’t about fear. It’s about responsibility. Because the next flood will come, and if we haven’t learned, then it’s not just nature we’ll have to blame, it’s ourselves.
Let’s stop mourning in the same places year after year. Let’s stop calling it God’s will when we know it’s policy. Let’s build for the world we’re in, not the one we wish we still lived in.
As a state, we owe it to those little girls to make sure this never happens again.
November 4: Constitutional/TX18/SD09 Election
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This is one of the clearest, most sobering things I’ve read about this. Thank you. We’ve turned “no one could’ve known” into a catchphrase for denial. But we did know. Scientists knew. Texans on the ground knew. Anyone paying attention to the last decade of storms knew.
What we didn’t do was act.
And you’re absolutely right—calling this “an act of God” lets the people in charge off the hook. This is policy failure, negligence dressed up in prayer language.
We can’t keep rebuilding in the same danger zones and pretending it’s all random. Climate change isn’t just a global problem. It’s local. It’s here. And it’s sweeping children away while the people who could do something about it keep playing culture war politics instead.
The next flood will come. The question is: will we have finally decided to care enough to stop pretending it’s someone else’s fault?
Like you, I've been glued to news reports. Climate change is real; it's devasting and heartbreaking. Agree with everything you said. As I'm writing this, CNN just showed photos of a Mystic cabin with beds and mattresses thrown about. There are no words for how I feel.