Trump heads to Texas to survey devastation after July 4 floods kill 120

US President Donald Trump flew on Friday morning for central Texas to see the devastation wrought by the July 4 flash floods, which killed at least 120 people and left scores missing.

His visit comes at the conclusion of a week in which concerns have been raised about the government’s reaction to the terrible downpour, with prospects of finding any more survivors fading fast. Thousands of first responders have searched through muddy debris littered areas of the Texas Hill Country in the aftermath of the tragedy, but no survivors have been discovered since the day of flooding.

Last Friday, heavy rains sent a wall of water roaring down the Guadalupe River in the early morning hours of the US Independence Day holiday. The disaster is the deadliest of the Republican president’s nearly six-month term in office.

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“It’s a horrible thing,” Trump told reporters as he departed the White House on Friday. “Nobody can even believe it, such a thing - that much water that fast.”

According to a White House official, when Trump arrives in the flood-ravaged area of south-central Texas, he will visit with victims’ families as well as emergency workers.

He will also receive a briefing from local officials and visit areas in Kerr County, which is the epicentre of the destruction. The county is located in what is known as “flash flood alley,” an area that has experienced some of the country’s deadliest flooding.

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Over a foot of rain poured in less than an hour on July 4. Flood gauges indicated that the river’s height increased from around a foot to 34 feet in a couple of hours, pouring over its banks and washing away trees and structures in its path.

Kerr County officials say more than 160 people remain unaccounted for, although experts say that the number of people reported missing in the wake of disasters is often inflated.

The dead include at least 36 children, many of whom were campers at the nearly century-old Camp Mystic, an all-girls Christian summer retreat on the banks of the river.

Local and federal officials have faced scrutiny for their response, including questions about whether they could have done more to warn people of the rising floodwaters.

The county declined to install an early-warning system years ago after failing to secure state money to cover the cost. In an interview of NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Thursday ahead of the trip, Trump appeared to support any fresh initiative to install such alarms.

“After having seen this horrible event, I would imagine you’d put alarms up in some form,” Trump said.

The Texas state legislature will convene in a special session later this month to investigate the flooding and provide disaster relief funding.

The US Senate’s top Democrat, Chuck Schumer, on Monday asked a government watchdog to investigate whether cuts at the National Weather Service affected the forecasting agency’s response. The NWS has defended its forecasting and emergency management, noting it assigned extra forecasters to two Texas offices over the holiday weekend.

The Trump administration has said the agency was sufficiently staffed and responded adequately to “an act of God.” On NBC, he described the flooding as a “once-in-every-200-year event.”

Trump has also largely sidestepped questions about his plans to shrink or abolish the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which coordinates the US government’s disaster response efforts, and reassign many of its key functions to state and local governments.

“I’ll tell you some other time,” Trump said on Tuesday, when asked by a reporter about FEMA.