Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) spoke about ongoing search and rescue efforts and provided new numbers of missing persons and fatalities in the wake of devastating floods in Texas.
00:00thank everybody for being here I just visit with some locals who live around
00:10here including a family member of the owner of this store I let her know that
00:17I first came to the store about 20 years ago 21 years ago been to this store
00:29every year for many years I've seen these little campers since they were just a
00:37little bit bigger than toddlers young kids I've seen them grow and mature into
00:46beautiful young men and women nothing is as heart-wrenching is hearing the stories
00:56of what the girls around here especially the girls at Camp Mystic went through to
01:03see where they lived in one moment where they disappeared the next moment they
01:12were gone forever a few moments after that I wanted these people to know I want
01:19you ought to know the hearts of our fellow Texans are breaking every single day
01:25because of what people of this community and the surrounding area are going
01:30through there's nothing more important on our hearts and minds than the people of
01:37this community especially those who are still lost I told them what we were doing
01:44not just today but what we are going to be doing for the days weeks and months to
01:49come this is what they needed to hear they need to know Texas is in this with the
01:57people in the hill country right here we are not leaving until this job is
02:03finished the job right now the primary job right now continues to be locating
02:14everybody who was affected by this flood there still remain those who are
02:19missing we have to find every single person who's missing and that's job number
02:27one while we are doing that job it's important that we also
02:32be conducting other business affecting the storm we did several things in that
02:38regard today one is to get a better assessment about what exactly needed to
02:44be provided for the community we took a flyover to get that assessment I've been
02:52here for multiple times over the course of the past two decades but multiple times
02:56over the course of just this one flooding episode and I have a good feel on the
03:01ground of what is needed but when you're in the air you get a fuller
03:04perspective of how widespread how catastrophic the damage is and what
03:10must be done to fully address it we were able to process that better day today when
03:17we flew around and on that fly around today I had with me the speaker of the
03:22house Dustin Burroughs who's going to speak after myself I want to provide you with
03:28some information some of which is just now updated first the numbers that I have is
03:36that there are ninety four fatalities ninety four fatalities associated with
03:47this flooding event in this area separate from that in other flooding events and
03:54other parts of the state of Texas there's another 15 fatalities for a total of 109 to
04:01put this into perspective just in the Kerr and Kendall counties alone there are far
04:08more fatalities than there were in Hurricane Harvey that's how catastrophic this is I also
04:16have some updated numbers on those who are missing first from Camp Mystic my
04:24information is those who are missing is down to now five campers and one counselor
04:32five campers and one counselor missing in addition to that there is a another
04:37child not associated with the camp who is missing so for Kerr County that would be a
04:44a total of seven who are missing in other parts of the state there are 12 who are
04:54missing I have a new number however so one thing we've been reaching out to the
05:01public about is to get better information about those who were not registered at a
05:06camp those who were not registered at a hotel those who may have been down here who
05:10no one really had any accounting of and through law enforcement agency working together they
05:17provided me this number just in the Kerr County area alone there are 161 people who are known to be
05:28missing and again that comes from combined law enforcement efforts 161 known people who
05:35are missing know this we will not stop until every missing person is accounted for know
05:46this also they're very likely could be more added to that list one way that we were able to expand the
05:54list of those who are missing is because family members friends neighbors etc begin calling in and
06:01reporting them as missing what I want to do is once again provide a reminder to anybody watching this
06:07that if you have a friend a family member somebody that you think may be missing because of this storm
06:13we need you to call the number that I'm about to give you it is eight three zero two five eight one one one one
06:22one that's eight three zero two five eight one one one one if you want to go to a website address you can go to
06:32Kerrville missing at dps.texas.gov I'm going to repeat it twice more that's Kerrville spelled k-e-r-r-v-i-l-l-e no space then the word missing in my ssing so Kerrville missing at
06:50dps.texas.gov so either call that phone number go to that website and provide the name and the best
07:04identification you can and the last known location of anybody that you think is missing know this also
07:12if you make a prank call or provide false information that's a crime do not provide false
07:20information because you're hindering our ability to undertake this investigation hindering our ability
07:26to actually rescue and find those who truly are missing so you better be correct when you're calling
07:32and let us know that there is somebody who is missing
