The relentless deluge that swamped vast swathes of Texas has left a trail of devastation, with flood rescue teams tirelessly searching for more than 160 missing people as the death toll tragically climbs.

Days after torrential rains unleashed catastrophic flooding across the state, the grim reality of the disaster is unfolding.

Emergency responders, utilizing boats, helicopters, and even high-water vehicles, are navigating submerged roads and debris-strewn landscapes in a desperate race against time.

The search is hampered by the sheer scale of the flooding, with many areas still inaccessible and communication lines down.

The rising death toll is a sobering reminder of the destructive power of the storms.

While precise figures are still emerging amidst the chaos, each confirmed fatality underscores the human cost of this natural disaster.

Families anxiously await updates, clinging to hope while grappling with the uncertainty of their loved ones' fate.

The emotional toll on communities is immense, with many having lost their homes, businesses, and cherished possessions.

Beyond the immediate search and rescue efforts, the immense task of recovery and rebuilding looms large.

The extent of the damage to infrastructure, including roads, bridges, and power lines, is significant, posing further challenges to rescue and relief efforts.

The long-term economic and social consequences of the floods are likely to be profound, demanding substantial resources and a coordinated, sustained response from all levels of government and the wider community.

As the waters recede, the full extent of the damage will become clearer, and the long road to recovery will begin.

The ongoing search for the missing remains a critical priority, a desperate bid to bring closure and offer solace to those left behind.

The search for scores of people still missing stretched into a fifth day Tuesday as the death toll continued to rise.

At least  and more than 160 people remain unaccounted for, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said during a news conference Tuesday afternoon. Rescue operations were underway to find anyone lost in the debris after the catastrophic weekend storm, which caused the sprawling Guadalupe River to swell rapidly to near-unprecedented levels.

In Kerr County alone, there are 161 people known to be missing, Abbott said, and at least 12 people are missing in other parts of the state.

President Trump has signed a federal disaster declaration at Abbott's request, allowing the to deploy its own teams to support local rescue and recovery efforts as those operations press on. Ongoing storms have made the efforts especially challenging, officials said, but National Weather Service forecasts indicated conditions would begin to abate Tuesday. 

Kerr County — located in the flood-prone Hill Country west of Austin, the state capital — bore the brunt of the disaster. A large  — at least 87 — were in Kerr County.

At Camp Mystic, a girls' summer camp with cabins along the river in a rural part of Kerr County near Hunt, died in what the camp and surviving campers described as "catastrophic flooding." Some survivors said they woke up to water rushing through the windows. Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said Tuesday that crews continued to search for five missing campers and one counselor from Camp Mystic.

One child not associated with the camp is also missing, Abbott said Tuesday.

Hundreds of rescuers, including teams from local, state and federal agencies, as well as volunteers, are involved in the search, Texas Game Warden Ben Baker said Tuesday during a news conference. 

"It's very tragic whenever you see human life. But to see a child in that loss of life, is extremely tragic," Baker told a reporter who had asked about the impacts on rescuers' mental health.

Abbott said Tuesday he received a text message from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. that said the Department of Health and Human Services is set to declare a public health emergency for the Texas Hill Country flash floods.

"This will make it easier for health care and mental health providers from out of state to help both by traveling to the area and by telemedicine," Abbott said the message read.

Friday was the last time a missing person was found alive in Kerr County, according to authorities. But search crews continued to survey  in the hope of locating others who may have been lost in the floods that inundated Kerr County, Baker told reporters.

The river runs for approximately 230 miles through a region that sits between Austin and San Antonio, starting in Kerr County and ending along the Gulf Coast. It's nicknamed "flash flood alley" because the terrain makes it vulnerable to inundation.

Officials in five other Texas counties have also confirmed deaths in the flooding: Travis County, which includes Austin, as well as Burnet, Kendall, Williamson and Tom Green County.

Camp Mystic was "horrendously ravaged," Abbott wrote in a social media post after visiting the site, which had about 750 children staying there when the flood happened.

Whether communities in the path of the flooding has been heavily scrutinized and is the subject of ongoing debate. Kerr County officials declined to respond to reporters' inquiries on the matter during their Tuesday news conference.

Some have questioned if  and its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, potentially prevented local forecast offices from sufficiently preparing the public for the extent of the flooding.

Mr. Trump and his team have repeatedly rejected any suggestions that federal firings impacted forecasting or emergency preparedness ahead of the floods. 

A  found that from the National Weather Service were issued for Kerr County around the storms and flash flooding, which used escalating language as time went on. But some local residents said they did not receive emergency alerts on their phones nor did they understand how serious the situation had truly become until it actually happened.

The San Antonio and San Angelo weather service offices issued warnings for the areas affected by flooding. Officials with the union representing National Weather Service workers told TheNews there are 23 meteorologists staffed between those offices, which together have 10 vacant positions. 

In San Antonio, the office is missing a warning coordination meteorologist, a vital role that essentially liaises between forecasters and emergency management agencies in the region to plan how information about an extreme weather event will be disseminated to the public, and which steps to take to protect them.

Nim Kidd, the chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, said his office received a forecast Wednesday that predicted several inches of rain, but "the amount of rain that fell at this specific location was never in any of those forecasts." 

Dalton Rice, the city manager for Kerrville, in Kerr County, said during the same briefing that the storm "dumped more rain than what was forecasted."

Judge Rob Kelly, of Kerr County, said his area does "not have a warning system" in place for inclement weather, which may have been why people were not as prepared as they could have been. County officials had previously  but did not proceed with it because of the cost. Former Kerr County commissioner Tom Moser told TheNews the county had applied for a grant in the past to build the system but the application was not approved.

"If they can't afford to do it, then let us do it," Lt. Gov. Patrick said Monday, noting that the state could offer resources for Kerr County to implement a system. "We have a special session starting two weeks from today, and I think we can take that up and do some other things of funding these sirens. ... If there had been a siren, maybe that would have sparked people to say 'Oh, we have a massive disaster like five minutes away.'"

When asked about the emergency warnings on Tuesday, Abbott said everything would be discussed at the state Legislature session. 

"We're going to address every aspect of this storm to make sure we're going to have in place the systems that are needed to prevent deadly flooding events like this in the future," he told reporters.