{"id":374731,"date":"2026-07-15T23:06:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T23:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/374731\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T23:06:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T23:06:07","slug":"what-to-know-about-the-state-response-to-heavy-rainfall-flash-flooding-in-southwest-texas-central-austin-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/374731\/","title":{"rendered":"What to know about the state response to heavy rainfall, flash flooding in southwest Texas | Central Austin"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Updated 5:30 p.m. July 15<\/p>\n<p>This week&#8217;s flooding &#8220;is likely going to break records in Texas,&#8221; Gov. Greg Abbott told reporters July 15 at the State Operations Center in Austin.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I want to give you a comparison: The Fourth of July floods last year had rainfall of 20.29 inches,&#8221; Abbott said. &#8220;The&#8230; rainfall during this rainstorm is expected to be more than 30 inches.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>As of 5 p.m., no deaths had been reported due to the floods, Abbott said, adding that &#8220;we&#8217;ve got to keep it that way.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, said it is important to pay attention to &#8220;the rate of rainfall,&#8221; with meteorologists reporting three inches of rain per hour in some parts of South Texas.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It doesn&#8217;t matter where you live\u2014three inches of rain an hour will cause flooding,&#8221; Kidd said. &#8220;The far majority of the rescues that have taken place [today] are stranded motorists. Do not drive on the road where you cannot see the road, and if there is water on the road, turn around; do not drown.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In the past 24 hours, some areas along the Llano River in the Texas Hill Country had received over 5 inches of rain, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/hydromet.lcra.org\/#\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Lower Colorado River Authority records<\/a>. Communities in the Greater Houston area had largely received about one inch of rain or less in the same 24-hour period, per the<a href=\"https:\/\/www.harriscountyfws.org\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> Harris County Flood Warning System<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Published 4 p.m. July 15<\/p>\n<p>As heavy rain and flash flooding threatens large swaths of South and Central Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott is scheduled to speak to reporters about the state&#8217;s preparation for and response to the severe weather around 5 p.m. July 15.<\/p>\n<p>The big picture<\/p>\n<p>The heaviest rainfall is occurring in southwest Texas, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.weather.gov\/ewx\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">according to the National Weather Service<\/a>, with 10-15 inches of rain expected through June 16 along the U.S. 90 corridor west of San Antonio. As of 2:40 p.m. July 15, all or parts of 14 counties were under a <a href=\"https:\/\/forecast.weather.gov\/wwamap\/wwatxtget.php?cwa=EWX&amp;wwa=flash%20flood%20warning\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">flash flood warning<\/a>, including Comal, Hays and Bexar counties.<\/p>\n<p>The city of New Braunfels announced <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/story.php?story_fbid=1475020681338041&amp;id=100064903683780&amp;mibextid=wwXIfr&amp;rdid=rTUlCg8HGIacONUI#\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">several road closures<\/a> July 15, and the city also closed recreational access to the Comal River due to continued rainfall and rising water levels, <a href=\"https:\/\/communityimpact.com\/new-braunfels\/government\/new-braunfels-temporarily-closes-recreational-access-to-comal-river-due-to-continued-rainfall\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Community Impact reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>More details<\/p>\n<p>Dozens of other counties were under flood watches, advisories and warnings. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.weather.gov\/safety\/flood-watch-warning\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Per the NWS<\/a>, a flood watch means that &#8220;conditions are favorable&#8221; for flooding and flooding is possible, but is not guaranteed to occur. A flood advisory is issued when forecasted flooding is expected to &#8220;cause significant inconvenience&#8221; and may threaten life or property, while a flood warning means that flooding is imminent or already occurring.<\/p>\n<p>Fifty-nine counties were also under <a href=\"https:\/\/gov.texas.gov\/uploads\/files\/press\/Newer_Disaster_Declaration_.pdf\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a state disaster declaration<\/a> as of July 14, before the bulk of the rainfall began. Abbott activated <a href=\"https:\/\/gov.texas.gov\/news\/post\/governor-abbott-activates-state-emergency-response-resources-ahead-of-flash-flood-danger\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">state emergency response resources<\/a> to respond to the flooding\u2014including boat squads, rescue swimmers and Blackhawk helicopters\u2014days earlier.<\/p>\n<p>Stay tuned for updates from the governor&#8217;s news conference.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Updated 5:30 p.m. July 15 This week&#8217;s flooding &#8220;is likely going to break records in Texas,&#8221; Gov. Greg&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":374602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,698,11849,6071,12256,13365,122066,4872,2427,14380,132517,132516,1971,17238,2059,4375,120886,62546,4291,24784,13890],"class_list":["post-374731","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-bexar-county","tag-comal-county","tag-dps","tag-flash-flood-warning","tag-flash-flooding","tag-flood-safety","tag-gov-greg-abbott","tag-hays-county","tag-heavy-rainfall","tag-july-2025-texas-floods","tag-july-2026-texas-flooding","tag-national-weather-service","tag-news-conference","tag-press-conference","tag-severe-weather","tag-south-texas-flooding","tag-southwest-texas","tag-state-emergency-operations-center","tag-tdem","tag-texas-flooding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/374602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}