- A mom is sharing how her two sons, ages 7 and 9, survived the devastating floods in Texas over the Fourth of July weekend
- Her youngest son, who just graduated from kindergarten, was forced to climb up to the rafters in his cabin to avoid the rushing water
- While she’s grateful the boys are alive, she’s heartbroken for families who weren’t so lucky
A mom is speaking out after her two little boys survived the catastrophic flooding in Texas that has left at least 89 dead and more missing.
Braeden Davis, 9, and his brother, Brock Davis, 7, had only been at Camp La Junta in Hunt, Kerr County for a little over a day when historic rain caused the Guadalupe River to flood the camp on the morning of Friday, July 4.
Their mom, Keli Rabon, tells PEOPLE that her youngest son, Brock, was in his cabin with about 11 other boys and two counselors when the water came in. He had to climb up the bunk bed to the rafters to escape the rushing water.
“He made it out with just the shorts on his body,” Rabon, a 40-year-old content creator, says of what Brock was wearing when he was taken out of the cabin. He still doesn’t recall how he was removed from the flooded building. “He didn’t have a shirt on. He didn’t have socks or shoes on.”
She says Brock didn’t get to save any of his things, including the blue blanket he’s had since birth.
While Rabon is grateful her children survived, other families are grieving or waiting for news of their missing loved ones. Flooding in the Guadalupe River caused it to reach its second-highest height ever in the early morning hours of the Fourth of July, ABC News reported.
As rescue efforts extended into the fourth day, 75 bodies have been recovered in Kerr County, including 27 children, as of 8:30 a.m. local time on Monday, July 7, Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said at a news conference, CNN reported.
Ten campers from the all-girls camp, Camp Mystic, remain missing, as well as one counselor. In total, nearly 90 have died so far, according to CNN, the Associated Press and The New York Times. The Kerr County Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.
The all-boys camp Camp La Junta was in the same town as Camp Mystic.
Fortunately, Braeden’s cabin was on a higher elevation and wasn’t affected by the flooding. Instead, it served as a safe space for other boys to congregate. They played games and tried to distract themselves. But the brothers remained separated for much of the day.
“They spent the entire day not knowing how the other one was doing,” their mom says.
As the campers waited in the Texas heat, they were without much to eat or drink because the dining hall had been destroyed. Apple sauce and snack bars were dropped by the National Guard to hold the boys over until the campers were moved to a church in Kerrville where they eventually reunited with their families.
Rabon first learned that something was wrong when she received a text from Camp La Junta, which she saw around 8:30 a.m. on Friday morning. She says she didn’t realize how serious the situation was until she got a second text saying there was no power, cell service or wifi at the camp. When Rabon saw the news about the flooding, she jumped in the car with her dogs and her rainboots to make the four-hour drive from Houston. Her ex-husband, the boys’ father, arrived at Kerrville first.
“My heart felt like it was bursting from gratitude from seeing them,” Rabon says of seeing her sons for the first time that evening after they were rescued, “But also hurting so bad because I knew that there were so many other families who weren’t going to have that opportunity that night.”
The location of their reunion was also emotional. Rabon says that as she picked up her boys to take them to a restaurant for a quiet dinner where Braeden and Brock stuck to her like “magnets” that whole night. Meanwhile, parents of children who were campers at Camp Mystic arrived at a funeral home nearby to learn what bodies had been recovered.
“So, it was just a tale of two very different scenarios just across the street from each other,” Rabon says. “It was quite poignant.”
When she arrived home with her sons, Brock immediately determined what rafters in their house would be best to climb in case of a flood. “We just need to figure out how we’re going to get up there,” Brock, who just graduated from kindergarten, told his mom. “But that’ll be a good spot for us.”
