• Extreme flooding in central Texas has left at least 78 dead.
• Another 41 people remain missing, officials said.
• 10 girls from a summer camp are among those still missing.

On what should have been a festive Fourth of July, disaster struck in central Texas.

Flash flooding left at least 68 dead in Kerr County, including 40 adults and 28 children, Sheriff Larry Leitha said during a Sunday press conference.

During a separate press conference, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said an additional 10 people were dead in the broader central Texas area, bringing the total death toll close to 80.

Abbott said another 41 people are still missing across the affected area, including 10 children and one counselor from Camp Mystic, a Christian camp for girls along the Guadalupe River.

Abbott signed a federal disaster declaration on Saturday, which President Donald Trump signed on Sunday. Abbott also issued a disaster declaration for six Texas counties in addition to the 15 he identified on Friday, when heavy rains first caused the flooding.

On Truth Social, Trump said his administration was working with state and local officials to respond to the flooding.

"Melania and I are praying for all of the families impacted by this horrible tragedy," Trump wrote on Saturday. "Our Brave First Responders are on site doing what they do best. GOD BLESS THE FAMILIES, AND GOD BLESS TEXAS!"

The X account for Elon Musk's Starlink, SpaceX's satellite internet system, is offering support to affected residents. Musk has a strong presence in Texas through his companies Tesla, X, and SpaceX.

"In support of those impacted by flooding in Texas, Starlink is providing Mini kits for search and rescue efforts — ensuring connectivity even in dead zones — and one month of free service for thousands of customers in the region, including those who paused service so they can reactivate Starlink during this time," the post said.

Officials said over 12 inches of rain fell in the county on Friday. The National Weather Service first issued a flash flood warning at 4 a.m. on Friday.

It extended the flood watch until Monday at 7 p.m., saying there was "a threat of flash flooding from slow moving heavy rains overnight and through the day on Monday."

The region is a popular vacation destination and home to multiple summer camps for children. Camp Mystic in Hunt has about 750 campers. Two days after disaster struck, officials said they remain hopeful they can find survivors.

In a statement posted to its website, the Heart O' the Hills, another girls' camp based in Hunt, said its director, Jane Ragsdale, had died in the floods.

"We have received word that Jane Ragsdale did not make it," it said. "We are mourning the loss of a woman who influenced countless lives and was the definition of strong and powerful."

It added that the camp was not in session as the flooding hit, and that "most of those who were on camp at the time have been accounted for and are on high ground."

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said during an earlier press conference that the Guadalupe River rose 26 feet in just 45 minutes, washing away bridges and buildings in a wide area.

On Facebook, parents and community members have circulated flyers with contact numbers, urging the public to help locate the missing children.

Kerr County has an estimated population of about 53,900, according to a 2024 count by the US Census Bureau. The county sits in the Hill Country region of Central Texas, which includes cities like San Antonio and Austin. Beyond the Guadalupe River, the region is home to several others, including the Colorado, Concho, and Blanco Rivers.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

• Cities all over the world, including on the US East and Gulf Coasts, are sinking.
• This phenomenon, called subsidence, can make extreme flooding worse and damage infrastructure.
• From New York to Houston, these 13 cities are losing height each year.

Cities are sinking across the US, some at a few fractions of a millimeter each year, while others lose up to six millimeters a year.

This phenomenon, called subsidence, is a "slow-moving yet widespread hazard," said Manoochehr Shirzaei, a geophysicist at Virginia Tech who co-authored a study published in Nature in March that measured subsidence in 32 coastal cities in the US.

Sinking can come from the sheer weight of skyscrapers and infrastructure, or from people drawing water from underground. Some of it is leftover from the last Ice Age.

Coastal cities worldwide are already prone to catastrophic flooding as sea levels rise because of the climate crisis. Factor in sinking, and the world's vulnerability to future coastal flooding triples, according to a 2019 study.

In the US, sea-level rise combined with subsidence could expose $109 billion of coastal property to high-tide flooding by 2050, according to Shirzaei's calculations.

The good news is that there are relatively inexpensive solutions to subsidence, Shirzaei told Business Insider in an email.

"The key takeaway is that we still have sufficient time to manage this hazard," he said.

Here are the biggest cities that are sinking the most, according to his new study, in geographical order starting from the northern East Coast.

Boston, Massachusetts

Shirzaei and his co-authors have found that there's a lot of variation in subsidence throughout Boston. When sinking occurs at different rates like that, it can put extra strain on infrastructure.

For example, some areas of Boston are sinking about 1 millimeter per year, give or take. Others sink nearly 4 millimeters a year — which translates to almost 4 centimeters per decade.

New York City

The Big Apple is losing about 1.5 millimeters of height each year.

All three airports in the NYC area are sinking, too, according to a study Shirzaei co-authored in 2024. JFK is sinking about 1.7 mm per year, LaGuardia at 1.5 mm per year, and Newark's airport is clocking 1.4 mm per year.

LaGuardia, for one, has already installed water pumps, berms, flood walls, and flood doors. Previous estimates had Laguardia flooding monthly by 2050 and fully underwater by 2100 — and that's without subsidence.

Jersey City, New Jersey

Just across the Hudson River, Jersey City is matching NYC's pace of about 1.5 millimeters per year.

To measure sinking at such a granular level, Shirzaei and his co-authors mapped ground deformations using a satellite-based radar technique called InSAR (short for Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar).

Atlantic City, New Jersey

A little further south, Atlantic City has its neighbors beat with a subsidence of about 2.8 millimeters per year.

A portion of the East Coast's subsidence is a leftover reaction from the disappearance of the Laurentide ice sheet, which covered much of North America during the last Ice Age. The ice sheet's bulk caused the exposed land around its edges to bulge upward — and the mid-Atlantic region is still settling down from the ice sheet's retreat.

Virginia Beach, Virginia

Virginia Beach, Virginia, is sinking 2.2 millimeters per year. Meanwhile, sea level rise has become a growing concern for locals.

In 2021, residents voted in favor of a $568 million program to build infrastructure that guards against rising sea level, according to PBS news.

Charleston, South Carolina

Charleston is the most populous city in South Carolina and its downtown sits on a peninsula flanked by the Ashley River and Cooper River. The city overall is sinking at a median rate of 2.2 millimeters per year, though in some areas its more dramatic at a rate of 6 millimeters per year.

Savannah, Georgia

Savannah is losing almost 2 millimeters per year, though some areas are sinking as much as 5 millimeters per year.

Over 13,000 properties in Savannah are at risk of flooding over the next 30 years, according to the climate risk analysis group First Street. That's over 23% of all homes in the city.

Miami

Last year, a study found that luxury high-rises were slowly sinking on the barrier islands surrounding Miami, possibly due to vibration from nearby construction. Shirzaei found the mainland is sinking, too, by about half a millimeter each year.

Mobile, Alabama

Mobile is losing 1.87 millimeters per year. The Gulf Coast city experiences some of the highest volume of rain in the US, according to the city's official website, and encourages all residents to have disaster survival kits, including canned foods and flashlights, on hand in the event of a flooding emergency.

Biloxi, Mississippi

Biloxi has the most drastic subsidence of all the US cities Shirzaei's team assessed. On the whole, Biloxi is sinking about 5.6 millimeters per year, with a lot of variation. Some parts of the city may be sinking as much as 10 millimeters per year.

New Orleans

New Orleans is losing 1.3 millimeters per year. First Street reports that 99.6% of all properties in the city are at risk of flooding in the next 30 years.

Houston and Galveston, Texas

Shirzaei found that Galveston, Texas, is sinking more than 4 millimeters a year, but inland parts of Houston have also been sinking for decades due to groundwater extraction.

Corpus Christi, Texas

Corpus Christi is sinking almost 3 millimeters per year. Some researchers think local oil and gas drilling has contributed to subsidence, reported local ABC outlet KIIV

"Extraction, generally, we believe it initiates and activates movement around faults and those could initiate land subsidence in some areas," Mohamed Ahmed, a geophysics professor at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, told the outlet.

What about the West Coast?

Shirzaei's team didn't find much subsidence in California's coastal cities, although the state's inland Central Valley is sinking due to groundwater extraction.

As for Oregon and Washington, the researchers simply don't have good enough data yet to say what's happening to the ground there.