Family shares last photo of 8‑year-old Camp Mystic victim with heartfelt note after Texas flood tragedy

The fam­i­ly of 8‑year-old Renee Sma­jstr­la has shared the last pho­to of the girl after she was con­firmed as one of the vic­tims of the Texas

KERR COUNTY, TEXAS: The fam­i­ly of 8‑year-old Renee Sma­jstr­la has shared the last pho­to she was in after she was con­firmed as one of the vic­tims of the cat­a­stroph­ic flash floods that tore through a sum­mer camp in Kerr Coun­ty, Texas.

Renee was one of nine chil­dren killed at Camp Mys­tic when the Guadalupe Riv­er rose a stag­ger­ing 26 feet in just 45 min­utes

On Fri­day, July 4 dev­as­tat­ing flash floods tore through the Chris­t­ian sleep-away camp for girls aged 7 to 17, sweep­ing away between 23 and 25 campers. The pow­er­ful surge of water hit dur­ing the night, destroy­ing parts of the camp, includ­ing sev­er­al cab­ins where the girls had been sleep­ing

Fam­i­ly of 8‑year-old who died at sum­mer camp after Texas floods pays trib­ute

Renee Smajstrla’s fam­i­ly has pub­licly mourned the loss of their 8‑year-old daugh­ter, who trag­i­cal­ly died in the flash floods that struck a Texas sum­mer camp.

In an emo­tion­al social media post, her uncle, Shawn Salta, con­firmed her death and shared a final pho­to of Renee, tak­en just hours before the dis­as­ter. The pic­ture shows her smil­ing bright­ly, dressed in pink, sit­ting on the steps at Camp Mys­tic, an all-girls Chris­t­ian sum­mer camp where she had spent her last day.

Salta wrote. “We are thank­ful she was with her friends and hav­ing the time of her life, as evi­denced by this pic­ture from yes­ter­day,”

He also thanked the com­mu­ni­ty for their sup­port, not­ing that the wide­spread social media out­reach may have played a role in help­ing first respon­ders iden­ti­fy Renee more quick­ly.

He shared, “While not the out­come we prayed for, the social media out­reach like­ly assist­ed the first respon­ders in help­ing to iden­ti­fy her so quick­ly.”

Ear­li­er that day, while Renee was still miss­ing, her aunt Michelle had turned to the pub­lic for help, describ­ing “a long day of wor­ry and prayer” as the fam­i­ly clung to hope that she would return home “safe and sound.”

9‑year-old girl dies at summer camp as police vow to continue searching for every missing person

Nine-year-old Janie Hunt has been con­firmed as one of the young vic­tims of the dev­as­tat­ing Texas floods. Her moth­er, Anne, shared the heart­break­ing news with CNN, reveal­ing she had been pray­ing” for her daughter’s safe return.

Janie was among the many chil­dren attend­ing a sum­mer camp when flash floods struck, leav­ing more than 25 girls still unac­count­ed for. In addi­tion, an unde­ter­mined num­ber of res­i­dents from sur­round­ing areas remain miss­ing

Nine-year-old Janie Hunt has been con­firmed as one of the young vic­tims of the dev­as­tat­ing Texas floods (Screengrab/CNN Weath­er)

Most of the campers were evac­u­at­ed to high­er ground, where res­cuers were able to reach them. Thir­teen-year-old Eli­nor Lester, one of the sur­vivors, described the chaos, telling that “the camp was com­plete­ly destroyed.”

She recalled being wok­en up just after mid­night as res­cue teams entered her cab­in, tying the chil­dren togeth­er with ropes and guid­ing them across a bridge while flood­wa­ters swirled around their legs. “A heli­copter land­ed and start­ed tak­ing peo­ple away. It was real­ly scary,” she said

Author­i­ties have issued mul­ti­ple flash flood warn­ings, with heavy rain­fall still threat­en­ing the region. Ker­rville City Man­ag­er Dal­ton Rice said the exact num­ber of miss­ing indi­vid­u­als remains uncer­tain. “We do not have an accu­rate count, and we don’t even want to begin to esti­mate at this time,” he stat­ed.

Despite the uncer­tain­ty, res­cue efforts con­tin­ue with urgency. Offi­cials report­ed that more than 850 res­i­dents have already been safe­ly evac­u­at­ed. As of Sat­ur­day, flash flood alerts remain active in Cen­tral Travis Coun­ty until 2 p.m. CDT. “We will not stop until every sin­gle per­son is found,” vowed the Coun­ty Sher­iff, “I can’t tell you how long it’s going to take.”

Over 1,000 per­son­nel, includ­ing heli­copter crews, spe­cial­ized swim­mers, drones, and mil­i­tary vehi­cles, have been deployed in a mas­sive search for any remain­ing sur­vivors.