I don't love crowds, but luckily we got there early enough to stake out a spot that wasn't too crowded (though people started filling in around us eventually) and we were willing to linger late until the worst of the crowds started to thin out. And yeah, for us the fireworks started at 9:15, so we weren't home until really late by the time we waited out the traffic at the end. I would have had to work the next day, except that I took this as my vacation for the summer. (Even on years that I do work the next day, we often still go... but definitely more of a struggle, ugh.)
I'm glad that Darji did okay with the fireworks! I feel like none of our asshole neighbors who shoot them off every night care about the weather - they'll be out there in the rain still doing it, ugh. Or if it's raining too hard, they'll just wait for it to let up and then start shooting them off around 2 or 3 in the morning. So annoying.
I have heard about all the flooding down there. I think the most recent death toll I saw was 104? 27 of those were the girls from the camp that were killed, I think? I'm sure the deaths will climb more, since they won't even confirm an estimated number for how many people (outside of that one camp) that are still missing.
The rain would probably be more helpful if it was spread out instead of just flooding one area!
The national weather service DID provide warnings... but none of the local Texas officials were willing to pass those warnings on, apparently. They did try to claim that the NWS didn't warn them, until the NWS showed the timestamped reports they'd provided. I think there was one "well, so many warnings end up being false alarms, we just sort of ignored them..." answer, but mostly they've just refused to say why they didn't actually provide the warnings they were supposed to.
I did also see a report about how they were recommended to put flood detection and early warning systems in back in like, 2017, I think it was? But they didn't because they said it was too expensive.
It sucks, because this is a lot of "finding out" after the "fucking around", but it really wasn't 20-some kids going to summer camp that deserved to be killed for it.
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And yeah, for us the fireworks started at 9:15, so we weren't home until really late by the time we waited out the traffic at the end. I would have had to work the next day, except that I took this as my vacation for the summer. (Even on years that I do work the next day, we often still go... but definitely more of a struggle, ugh.)
I'm glad that Darji did okay with the fireworks! I feel like none of our asshole neighbors who shoot them off every night care about the weather - they'll be out there in the rain still doing it, ugh. Or if it's raining too hard, they'll just wait for it to let up and then start shooting them off around 2 or 3 in the morning. So annoying.
I have heard about all the flooding down there. I think the most recent death toll I saw was 104? 27 of those were the girls from the camp that were killed, I think? I'm sure the deaths will climb more, since they won't even confirm an estimated number for how many people (outside of that one camp) that are still missing.
The rain would probably be more helpful if it was spread out instead of just flooding one area!
The national weather service DID provide warnings... but none of the local Texas officials were willing to pass those warnings on, apparently. They did try to claim that the NWS didn't warn them, until the NWS showed the timestamped reports they'd provided. I think there was one "well, so many warnings end up being false alarms, we just sort of ignored them..." answer, but mostly they've just refused to say why they didn't actually provide the warnings they were supposed to.
I did also see a report about how they were recommended to put flood detection and early warning systems in back in like, 2017, I think it was? But they didn't because they said it was too expensive.
It sucks, because this is a lot of "finding out" after the "fucking around", but it really wasn't 20-some kids going to summer camp that deserved to be killed for it.