The Guadalupe River long has been a haven of adventure and joy. After deadly flooding, it’s a source of grief with an uncertain future

The state’s deadliest freshwater flooding in more than a century quickly killed more than 100 people – including Frizzell, a heroic father, camp leaders and dozens of children.

(CNN) — Ron Duke treasured the Guadalupe River more than anything.

The 80-year-old loved to kayak along the crystal clear waterway that wends some 250 miles from the springs of Texas Hill Country to the Gulf’s San Antonio Bay. His woodshop stood nearby, his friends told CNN affiliate KPRC, and he took every opportunity to enjoy its banks.

So did Holly Frizzell, 72, who in recent years – after the ones she devoted to caring for her ailing husband – found “peace, joy, and reflection” along the Guadalupe.

“It was where she laughed with her family and friends,” her family said, “made memories with her grandchildren, and sat quietly.”

For generations, this river has been the centerpiece of communities across Kerr and Kendall counties, its natural splendor feeding the spirits – and livelihoods – of so many connected to its boating outfitters, restaurants and nature centers, its churches, neighborhoods and RV parks, and the 18 or so youth camps where thousands of kids spend weeks each summer.

But the Guadalupe River, named in 1689 by Spanish explorers for a revered apparition of the mother of Jesus Christ, also long has held a quiet fury that can unleash powerful, often deadly flooding in a matter of just minutes.

That rage unleashed again last week when, instead of Kerrville’s planned annual Fourth on the River celebration at Louise Hays Park, more than a summer’s worth of rain fell on bone-dry soil overnight into Independence Day, creating a deluge that pushed the Guadalupe from about 3 feet to 30 feet in just 45 minutes.

The state’s deadliest freshwater flooding in more than a century quickly killed more than 100 people – including Frizzell, a heroic father, camp leaders and dozens of children – while ripping through homes, businesses and cabins.

Now, as difficult searches for more than 160 still missing enter a sixth day, communities along the Guadalupe River are left to reconcile how to pick up the pieces around a waterway that remains both a wellspring and a looming menace.

Beloved river ‘turned into an enemy’

The Guadalupe River “was our best friend,” said CNN’s Pamela Brown, who as a child bunked along it in some of the same Camp Mystic cabins from which hundreds of girls last week had to be rescued – and several are still missing.

The all-girls Christian summer retreat northwest of San Antonio was among the local camps in areas known to flood. Still, it holds some of Brown’s fondest childhood memories, especially of playing games and looking for dinosaur fossils in the shallow parts of the Guadalupe River.

The river was the heart and soul of the camp experience, Brown said.

But last week, she added, “it turned into an enemy for these sweet kids.”

Parents dropping off yet another generation of daughters, some as young as 7, a few days earlier for the season’s second session didn’t know many good-byes would be their last.

Flood’s magnitude was ‘unfathomable’

For centuries, flash flooding has erupted along nearly every part of the Guadalupe River basin, with an uptick over the last 20 years in its frequency and magnitude, the US Geological Survey says.

When floods come, “steep topography produces rapidly rising river stages,” the agency adds, giving people who live and play along the Guadalupe scant warning. The region, experts around the turn of this century said, is one of the country’s three most dangerous for flash floods.

A memorial at Kerr County’s Pot O’ Gold Ranch youth camp honors the 10 teenagers killed in 1987 when train-effect storms pushed the Guadalupe River up 29 feet in a single morning. The flash flood arrived in 10-foot waves while the group was trying to leave by bus, the pastor who led that outing recalled this week to CNN affiliate WFAA.

“The water just started pushing people down the river,” Richard Koons said, “what now has become a massive wall of water.”

Since then, efforts in Kerr County to build a more substantial flood warning system have been discussed – but have faltered or been abandoned due to budget concerns, leaving the epicenter of last week’s floods without emergency sirens to warn residents about rising waters.

While the National Weather Service issued numerous warnings early Friday morning as the danger along the Guadalupe River increased, it’s not clear how well they reached remote areas and how factors from reception quality to personal phone settings came into play.

For Koons, watching another flood tragedy unfold along the Guadalupe River has been “absolutely brutal.”

“It’s crushing to know that they are still looking and hoping,” he told WFAA. “This magnitude is unfathomable.”

Avid kayaker still among the missing

Christian Brown got a flash flood warning last week while he, his wife and children were starting their Fourth of July weekend at the Guadalupe River cabin that had been in his family for over 75 years.

The waterway quickly rose to 3 feet, he recalled.

Brown and the others jumped on a bunk bed – and sang “Amazing Grace” to try to stay calm.

“And then, finally, one of the back doors actually gave way, and the floodwaters just came rushing into the cabin,” he said. “All of our furniture and lamps, everything was falling down, crashing, breaking, and we just kind of stayed up there to assess the situation.”

The water inside the cabin rose to about 4 feet – above the doorknobs – before it finally crested, he explained.

“We’re just mostly thankful that everything that we lost is replaceable,” he said. “Our hearts go out to those that weren’t quite as lucky as us.”

Among those still missing is Duke, the octogenarian kayaker and naturalist whose open-air shop along the river was a community hub, his friends told KPRC. His town of Hunt got about 6.5 inches of rain in just three hours Friday: a 1-in-100-year rainfall event.

River communities ponder their future

Duke’s home and shop are now a pile of wood intertwined with his memories and belongings, including a single paddle, perhaps an ode to his love for kayaking, friends told KPRC.

President Donald Trump has signed a major disaster declaration, unlocking key federal resources for search and rescue efforts. But questions remain about how his promises to phase out the Federal Emergency Management Agency could affect the area’s recovery.

Meanwhile, as rising global temperatures push weather toward extremes, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has vowed state help to install flood sirens in the area “by the next summer.”

Still, residents and business owners in the Guadalupe River’s flood zones often don’t realize the danger they’re in, experts say. Cabins in the part of Camp Mystic most affected by last week’s flood, for instance, have been there for more than 50 years, historical aerial imagery shows, even as new construction or major renovations in those flood zones would require a review by a floodplain manager, Kerr County documents say.

At Lamps & Shades, a shop nestled for 30 years along the Guadalupe River’s Historic Old Ingram Loop, the owners – with their daughter, who lived through Hurricane Katrina – just learned their insurance doesn’t cover floods, she told CNN affiliate KTVT.

“There’s a lot of amazing communities around the world, but this (one) is special,” Amy Grace Ulman said, hopeful about the future. “People really are just showing up out of every corner.”

For now, the Guadalupe River has receded to its cypress-lined banks, again offering a place to bird watch, ride bikes, picnic and geocache for “treasures” hidden in the wild as people in Hill Country and online around the world band together to help Central Texas figure out what comes next.

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