The flash flooding in central Texas along the Guadalupe River has claimed the lives of more than 80 individuals, officials said Monday morning.
“In Kerr County, officials reported 75 deaths, including 48 adults and 27 children,” NBC News noted.
According to reports, at least 27 children and counselors from Camp Mystic, an all-girls summer camp in Kerr County, are deceased.
President Trump signed a “Major Disaster Declaration” for Kerr County.
“Thank you, @realDonaldTrump, for your dedication to Texas. Collaboration between our state, local, and federal partners is critical to our state’s recovery. Thank you to our brave first responders working around the clock to find missing Texans,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said.
The Texas National Guard has rescued hundreds of flood victims as operations continue to find those who remain missing.
USA TODAY noted:
There were about 700 children at the camp when relentless rain caused the nearby Guadalupe River to surge over 26 feet in less than an hour on Friday, said Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. Photos taken at the scene show a building where some of the children slept with broken windows and a blown-out wall. Among the mud-covered debris were pink blankets and stuffed animals.
As rescuers resumed searches for missing people by air, land and water, officials warned those in central Texas that the flood threat was not over. Multiple flash flood warnings were active across Hill Country on Monday as storms drenched the region, inundating roads and waterways.
Potent, slow moving storms over central Texas have begun to trigger flooding in hard-hit parts of the state. Forecasters with the National Weather Service have issued flash flood warnings and say several more inches were expected to fall through the rest of the day.
Rescue teams on Monday were traversing storm-ravaged terrain and scouring for signs of life as a search for the missing grew more desperate. At least 41 known people remained unaccounted for, officials said Sunday, noting that the total is likely higher as thousands were on vacation in the Texas Hill Country when the floods broke out.
In the wake of the disaster, Rainmaker Technology Corporation, a California-based cloud-seeding technology company, faces scrutiny that it possibly contributed to the unprecedented storms.
“The natural disaster in the Texan Hill Country is a tragedy. My prayers are with Texas. Rainmaker did not operate in the affected area on the 3rd or 4th or contribute to the floods that occurred over the region. Rainmaker will always be fully transparent,” CEO Augustus Doricko said.
“Overnight from July 3rd – 4th, moisture surged into the Hill Country from the Pacific as remnants of Tropical Storm Barry moved across the region. At 1:00 a.m. on July 4th, the National Weather Service (NWS), which we work closely with to maintain awareness of severe weather systems, issued a flash flood warning for San Angelo, Texas. Note, summer convective cloud seeding operations in Texas do not occur during overnight hours. At 4:00 a.m. on July 4th, the NWS issued a life-threatening emergency warning, and flooding ensued,” he continued.
“Did Rainmaker conduct any operations that could have impacted the floods? No. The last seeding mission prior to the July 4th event was during the early afternoon of July 2nd, when a brief cloud seeding mission was flown over the eastern portions of south-central Texas, and two clouds were seeded. These clouds persisted for about two hours after seeding before dissipating between 3:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. CDT. Natural clouds typically have lifespans of 30 minutes to a few hours at most, with even the most persistent storm systems rarely maintaining the same cloud structure for more than 12-18 hours. The clouds that were seeded on July 2nd dissipated over 24 hours prior to the developing storm complex that would produce the flooding rainfall,” Doricko continued.
“To ensure safety and prevent any risk of flooding from cloud seeding, Rainmaker suspended operations in accordance with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulations suspension criteria, listed below,” he noted.
“I encourage the meteorology community to ask questions and scrutinize our claims, and we will continue to be fully transparent in answering. Attached is a meteorological report on the events,” Doricko added.
In February 2025, Rainmaker secured approval to perform weather modification in Texas.
Watch testimony from Doricko below:
Full text:
Review Rainmaker’s NOAA approval below:
Journalist Celia Farber said Doricko is a “25-year-old UC Berkeley dropout and Thiel Fellow.”
From the Los Angeles Business Journal:
Rainmaker, a cloud seeding startup based in El Segundo, announced in mid-May that it raised $25 million in series A funding. The round was led by Sawtelle-based Lowercarbon Capital and included participation from firms like Starship Ventures, Long Journey Ventures and 1517 Ventures.
Rainmaker uses drones to not only produce moisture, but to also prove that the rain was indeed caused by Rainmaker and not natural causes.
“If I fly a plane up into a cloud and sprinkle some magic beans and then it rains, that doesn’t mean that I caused the rain. You can’t attribute that rain to your intervention because maybe it happened naturally,” said Doricko. “…if you have the right kind of radar and you fly in a zigzag or in a circle, and you only see the precipitation in your flight track, you can definitively prove that it is perfectly co-located with our flight track. This is exclusively man-made precipitation.”
“Rainmaker has raised $6.3 million for its seed round, the company announced today. The group of investors includes Long Journey Ventures, Day One Ventures, Tamarack Global, 1517 Fund, Starship VC, and Champion Hill Ventures, along with Garry Tan and (among other things) former Andreessen Horowitz partner Balaji Srinivasan,” Fortune wrote in May 2024.
We’ve also built strong relationships with amazing founders and operators and are excited to say that many of them have invested in Long Journey. People like Alfred Lin (via Sequoia Capital), Peter Thiel, Marc Andreesen, Chris Dixon, Keith Rabois, David Sacks, Lee Fixel, Chris Ovitz, Adrian Aoun, Jeff Fluhr, Marty Cagan, Emil Micheal, Elena Verna, Steve Eidelman, Lenny Rachtivksy, Andrew Chen, Michael Arrington, and many more.
The Thiel Foundation also contributed $100,000 to the Rainmaker CEO.
American Entrepreneurship explained:
https://100percentfedup.com/peter-thiel-linked-cloud-seeding-company-accused-sparking/The Thiel Foundation continues its commitment to innovation and disruption achieved by bright young minds, outside of academic studies, by announcing its 2024 class of Thiel Fellows. The latest cohort joins 270 alumni of the program that began in 2011.
The Fellowship gives each participant $100,000 and access to a valuable support network of tech founders, investors, scientists, and former fellows. The goal is for the 20 cohort members to go on to be successful like alumni who launched successful ventures that include Figma, Loom, Luminar, and others. When aggregated, startups graduating from the program are now worth billions of dollars.
To be eligible for the Thiel Fellowship the young innovative entrepreneurs agree to make their endeavor a full-time commitment whether it is a project, company, or idea. With the funds and support network, they can work “unencumbered by traditional academic constraints”.
“This year’s class understands the importance of the present moment. They reject the well-worn paths of red tape, digital distractions, and self-censorship,” said Alex Handy, director of the Thiel Fellowship. “By refusing to sit idle while others succumb to conformity’s paralysis, they’re positioned to finally deliver on the future.”
Those accepted into the 2024 Fellowship program represent a range of innovations such as Orchard Robotics which helps farmers improve crop production, Stream seeking to change crypto trading, and Rainmaker pioneering advanced cloud-seeding technology to combat drought.
