Plans to develop a flood monitoring system in the Texas county hit hardest by deadly floods were scheduled to begin only a few weeks later.

A retired nurse, her son and a family friend say they were lucky to survive last week's flash floods in Texas that killed more than 100 people, including many summer campers.

The Texas Hill Country has been notorious for flash floods caused by the Guadalupe River. Here's why the area is called "Flash Flood Alley."

Rain rushing to the Guadalupe took it from a depth of less than 8 feet to 37.5 feet, a deluge with as much volume as an aircraft carrier over five minutes.

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.

As the Guadalupe River swelled from a wall of water heading downstream, sirens blared over the tiny river community of Comfort -- a last-ditch warning to get out for those who had missed cellphone alerts and firefighters going street-to-street telling people to get out.

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.

Flash floods surged through in the middle of the night, but many local officials appeared unaware of the unfolding catastrophe, initially leaving people near the river on their own.

Over the last decade, an array of local and state agencies have missed opportunities to fund a flood warning system intended to avert the type of disaster that swept away dozens of youth campers and others in Kerr County,