It's Sunday

 

Before taking any questions, Texas’s governor Greg Abbott, the homeland security secretary Kristi Noem, the Texas senator John Cornyn and the representative Chip Roy opened today’s press conference with long statements of self-congratulation and praise for the response from local, state and federal officials. They also repeatedly thanked Donald Trump in effusive terms.

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Much of the statements from Abbott, Noem, Cornyn and Roy focused on praising their own efforts, thanking Trump and the White House and encouraging people to pray.

“Prayer matters,” Abbott said. Prayers “could have been the reason why water stopped rising”.

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There are still 27 people missing from the flooding event. Of the bodies recovered so far, five adults and three children are still unidentified.

  Guardian

Then maybe more than 27 are still missing?

Dalton Rice, the Kerrville city manager, said that 27 girls from Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along the Guadalupe River, are still missing. Other people who were in the area but not at the camp could also be missing, Rice added.

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Following two long statements from the Texas governor and US homeland security secretary praising their own response efforts, the senator John Cornyn took the mic at the press briefing and began: “My thanks to President Trump.”

Next to speak is representative Chip Roy, who opened with a joke, saying: “Before I was crazy enough to run for Congress” he spent a lot of time in this area. He goes on to praise the governor and the homeland security secretary.

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Officials have said the floods were not predicted by forecasts and that the river rose by 26ft (8 meters) in just 45 minutes. A local weather forecaster disputed that and said that warnings were issued hours before the disaster.