The grim task of searching for the scores of people missing from the devastating flood that struck Texas Hill Country nearly a week ago is taking an agonizing toll on searchers.

Most summers, Kerrville, Texas, draws crowds for its July 4 celebration. This year, the streets are filled with emergency responders.

A Mobile couple visiting their son and his family in Texas are among those still missing. Their daughter-in-law's body was found on Tuesday

In what experts call "Flash Flood Alley," the terrain reacts quickly to rainfall steep slopes, rocky ground, and narrow riverbeds leave little time for warning.

KERRVILLE, Texas (AP) — Over the last decade, an array of Texas state and local agencies missed opportunities to fund a flood warning system intended to avert a disaster like the one that killed dozens of young campers and scores of others in Kerr County on the Fourth of July.

This map shows where camps along the Guadalupe River were impacted by the July 4 flood. Meteorologists Pat Cavlin and Kim Castro detail how it all happened.

With more than 170 still missing, communities must reconcile how to pick up the pieces around a waterway that remains both a wellspring and a looming menace.

Growing up near the Guadalupe River in Kerrville, Texas, could sometimes feel like living near a volcano. I was born two blocks away from the gorgeous river that flows from the Hill Country to the Gulf of Mexico, just one year before the devastating and deadly 1987 flash flood, often described around town as the “big one.”