Who was the president in 2013?
So the owners of the camp wanted to have buildings in the flood zone.
“That designation means an area is likely to be inundated during a 100-year flood, one severe enough that it only has a 1% chance of happening in any given year.”
I doubt these models take into account cloud seeding.
More than FEMA, but local officials as well. Local zoning ordinances typical prohibit building in flood plains. No building permits should have been allowed. I would also believe that local emergency management officials should have been aware if the potential flood hazard to the camp and had an emergency evacuation plan particularly knowing the historic hazard of flash floods. Lots of blame to go around.
I’ve noticed that individuals who want to do something that requires a variance are unlikely to get one. But for developers or connected people the rules are mere suggestions. So, they need to look into who made the request and who suggested it should be accepted. Then, follow the money. But that’s unlikely to happen because...politics.
“Pralle, who reviewed the amendments for AP, noted that some of the exempted properties were within 2 feet of FEMA’s flood plain by the camp’s revised calculations, which she said left almost no margin for error.”
This person has zero understanding of statistics. Putting a building within 2 feet of a flood plane would leave “almost no margin for error” only in a bizarre world in which flood waters only ever got to the flood line, but no more. But that’s not how floods behave.
The camp is going to be found liable. Their liability policy will be maxed out. $5M? It won’t bring the girls back, but it would be wrong for the camp to skate entirely without consequences. Nobody wins, except the lawyers.
People become complacent. That’s when disaster can strike.
FEMA has no authority to prevent building in their mapped flood areas. Their maps are a tool for local officials and property owners to use as guidance to make wise building choices. It is up to state and local officials to manage development within mapped flood zones and that never has been FEMA’s responsibility. FEMA has no culpability in this matter but someone is going to try to blame them anyway.
Article:
“the process may favor the wealthy and well-connected”
The FEMA maps are a joke—for exactly that reason. It has been that way for many decades.
When I worked in commercial lending we never trusted those maps and always had our own experts visit the sites and make their own evaluations.
Part of that process was to search for local media coverage of floods in the past ten years.
It was amazing how many “100 year flood plain” areas had floods in the past ten years.
Lol.
About 170 people still missing. Relying on the governing for your safety and Lord only knows where you’ll end up at.
I hadn’t heard that the owner/director died that day! There’s been so much coverage repeated over and over that this news would/should have stood out!
Camp Mystic and the other camps were oblivious to contingency planning. It’s negligence. They could have hired an ex SEAL or SF to shape this type of plan.
In 2013, Homeland Security Secretary was Janet Napolitano from January 20, 2009 – September 6, 2013. Rand Beers was Acting Secretary from September 6, 2013 to December 23, 2013. Jeh Johnson became the next head of DHS on December 23, 2013 until January 20, 2017. Not sure who headed FEMA for Texas back then.
The adults in that camp were entrusted with the safety those children. They should have been monitoring the rain/flood situation and had a plan ready for rapid evacuation when a rare, but foreseeable event happened.
I believe the camp owners/operators bear primary responsibility for this tragedy.
The FIRMS are a crap shoot at best. Wouldn’t want to be the engineer/s of record for pulling the properties out of the flood plain.