'Give Us Room To Work': Kerrville Officer Sends A Message To People Visiting Flood Sites In Texas

Forbes Breaking News

Jonathan Lamb of the Kerrville Police Department spoke on Wednesday about people visiting flood sites.

Transcript

00:00Good morning, Jonathan Lamb, Kerrville Police Department.

00:10We want to remind folks that if you've reported a loved one missing and

00:15they've returned home safely or been found safely,

00:18it's finally important that you let us know that that person is no longer among the missing.

00:26We need to keep an accurate count as accurate as possible.

00:30So if you've reported somebody missing and they've been recovered safely, please let us know.

00:38Go to the website kerrvillemissing.dps.texas.gov or call 830-258-1111.

00:50Once again, kerrvillemissing.dps.texas.gov, 830-258-1111.

01:01We are actively looking, actively working, to ensure that we have an accurate count,

01:09so that we know who to look for.

01:11And now I want to talk to the people here in this community,

01:16inside the city limits of Kerrville, people in Kerr County.

01:21A few things.

01:22We know that folks are beginning to clean up.

01:25We have large debris piles.

01:28We ask them not to use heavy equipment to take down those debris piles

01:36until they've been checked by a search partner,

01:39because it's possible there are victims in that debris pile.

01:44We don't want to disturb that.

01:47Please give us a call, our non-emergency numbers at the police department and the sheriff's department,

01:53and let us know that you've got a debris pile that needs to be checked

01:56before you begin that level of cleanup.

02:01Sheriff Letha mentioned the burn ban.

02:04That's county-wide, and we need people to respect that.

02:07Do not burn during this time.

02:11And we continue to ask people to steer clear of the area and let our first responders work.

02:16Again, this operation is ongoing, continuous.

02:20Our first responders are trying to get to places to do their jobs,

02:25and people coming here from outside the community and people within the community

02:29who want to go sightsee and look at the river, see the flood damage, making our job very hard.

02:35We ask folks to give us room to work.

02:42I want to talk a little bit about the events that happened on the morning of July 4th,

02:49what the Kerrville Police Department and other first responders were doing in those early morning hours.

02:55And I want to start outside of Kerrville, out in Hong.

03:00For those of you who went out there yesterday with the governor,

03:03you all know that Highway 39 crisscrosses the Guadalupe again and again and again.

03:11And all of those low water crossings, when they flood, they create islands.

03:18You can't get in and you can't get out, trapping people in their homes, trapping people in vehicles.

03:24And that's what happened on the morning of July 4th.

03:26One of our patrol sergeants lives out there in Hong.

03:30And he got up, got ready to go to work.

03:33And he realized, when he hit the intersection of FM 1440 and Highway 39,

03:39that he was trapped on an island that was Funk, Texas.

03:44And he saw people, dozens of people, trapped on roofs.

03:47He gave them encouragement over his public address system in the vehicle.

04:00He told them to be strong, that he would get to them as quickly as he could and hang on.

04:09And he knew he needed help.

04:13He went to another detective, Kerrville Police Department detective,

04:16who lives out there.

04:17And he woke him up and he said, it's bad.

04:21I need you to get your gear on and come find me.

04:25And then he went back out.

04:28And for 13 hours, those two officers, along with some Funk volunteer fire department,

04:38firefighters and an emergency room doctor, provided care to that Hunt community.

04:46When it was safe to do so, they waded into the water and they rescued people.

04:52They got people down off the roofs.

04:54They collected them there at the Hunt School.

04:59There was a young boy with a pretty severe leg injury that was given first aid treatment

05:05throughout the day.

05:06Other people came.

05:10Many of them were injured.

05:11They provided first aid.

05:14They coordinated helicopter evacuations for the most critically injured.

05:19Communicated the situation back to our emergency dispatch center at Kerrville Police Department.

05:26When the waters began to recede, they knew that vehicles would be making their way out there

05:31when it's safe to do so.

05:32So they went back and forth clearing out debris to clear a path for those vehicles.

05:38They saw helicopters flying back and forth making recoveries upriver, evacuating those summer camps.

05:48And they were by themselves on that island that was hot Texas,

05:53doing what they do, serving, protecting, and helping,

05:58doing what they do.

05:59Until about five o'clock in the afternoon, when other emergency workers,

06:05high profile vehicles, were able to get out there.

06:09And here in town,

06:13the early morning hours are still dark.

06:16Our officers realized that areas of town that traditionally don't flood

06:22were going to flood.

06:23And that low-lying areas close to the river were in danger.

06:30Our officers spent hours going back and forth.

06:35In that first hour,

06:40they evacuated over 100 homeless and evacuated and rescued over 200 people.

06:47And to say that doesn't even come close to explaining the actions that took place.

06:53We're not going to do that.

06:57Door to door, waking people up, convincing them that yes,

07:03the floodwaters are coming and you need to leave now.

07:07They rescued people out of vehicles.

07:08They rescued people out of homes that were already flooding, pulling them out of windows.

07:16They entered water.

07:17There's a trailer park that flooded in minutes.

07:24One officer was there by himself and he realized, I need help.

07:29He sounded his siren driving up and down those streets that were beginning to flood,

07:34calling on his PA system for folks to wake up and evacuate.

07:40And then two other officers joined him through first thigh-deep, then waist-deep, then chest-deep water,

07:48as they went RVs and trailers and rescued people, carrying them safety through the water.

07:55Out on old FM 689, there were two people trapped in the water, clinging to a tree.

08:10Two officers were there when the third one drove up.

08:13And one of them was wrapping a 100-foot flex line garden hose around his waist to go into the water and rescue those people.

08:25And those three officers went into the water and one of them held that hose and acted as an anchor,

08:31while those other two made their way to those two victims.

08:34And they were able to evacuate them safely.

08:39Folks, I don't know how many lives our KPD team saved in an hour in Kerrville.

08:47But I know that this tragedy, as horrific as it is, could have been so much worse.

08:54And finally, I want to tell you about a member of our KPD team.

09:00These guys have been working around the clock.

09:024th of July, traditionally, is an all-hands-on-deck event for us, because we hold an amazing concert on the river.

09:15On July 4th, it was an all-hands-on-deck event for a very different reason.

09:21But our officers had been working without time off, without any downtime.

09:2516, 18, 20-hour shifts, without complaint.

09:28Yesterday was the first day we were able to give a couple of them some downtime.

09:35So we sent an officer home to rest.

09:39But rather than taking a day off, a much well-deserved day off,

09:42he got up and he put on his gear, and he volunteered to go out on foot with the ground search party.

09:51And he spent his day up and down the Guadalupe River, going over, under, around trees,

09:59searching for victims to try and reunite the missing with their families.

10:05I think that is Texans helping Texans in the greatest sense of the word.

10:19That's what community is.

10:22And that's what's important right now.

10:24I want to continue to thank you all for helping us spread the messages that need to be spread.

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