AUSTIN (AP) \u2014 One of the directors of Camp Mystic, the all-girls Christian camp along the Guadalupe River in the Texas Hill Country, offered a tearful apology Tuesday to the families of the 25 campers and 2 counselors killed in a 2025 flood.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe tried our hardest that night. It wasn\u2019t enough to save your daughters,\u201d said Edward Eastland, a member of the family that owns the 100-year-old camp. \u201cI\u2019m so sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eastland\u2019s apology came as dozens of the girls\u2019 family members sat just a few feet behind him during the second day of a special legislative hearing looking into the devastating July 4 flood. A written report of findings is expected later this year.<\/p>\n
Eastland said he and his father Richard Eastland were on the campsite that night, and that they made a desperate attempt to save the girls when they realized that heavy rain had created a raging flood that ripped through the camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River. Richard Eastland died in the flood and Edward survived only after being swept into a tree.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese girls (who died) were our youngest campers and their amazing counselors who we watched grow up,\u201d Eastland said. \u201cThe world was a better place with them in it and the anger at us for not being able to keep them safe is completely reasonable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Britt Eastland, another director, said the camp will train counselors and stage drills for campers to prepare for floods, fire, tornadoes and intruders. Legislative investigators on Monday noted the camp\u2019s previous lack of training as a critical problem that contributed to the deaths.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of these things should have been being done in the first place,\u201d said Sen. Charles Perry.<\/p>\n
Camp Mystic families are expected to testify later in the day.<\/p>\n
Camp Mystic\u2019s owners want to reopen in late May and have said they will only use parts of the camp that didn\u2019t flood. They expect nearly 900 girls on campus this summer. Those plans have angered victims\u2019 families, and some prominent state officials have called for state regulators to deny or delay renewal of the camp\u2019s license, which is under review.<\/p>\n
The Legislature doesn\u2019t meet again until January 2027, and the panel does not control the review of Camp Mystic\u2019s license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
AUSTIN (AP) \u2014 One of the directors of Camp Mystic, the all-girls Christian camp along the Guadalupe River in the Texas Hill Country, offered a tearful apology Tuesday to the families of the 25 campers and 2 counselors killed in a 2025 flood. \u201cWe tried our hardest that night. It wasn\u2019t enough to save your … Continue reading Camp Mystic director offers tearful apology to victims\u2019 families during legislative hearing<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2851],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1501859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-state-news-archive"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-15 13:33:52","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1501859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1501859"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1501859\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1502291,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1501859\/revisions\/1502291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1501859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1501859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1501859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}