A federal watchdog investigation into the National Weather Service's emergency warning systems ahead of last year’s fatal flooding in central Texas found that officials provided a timely, life-saving warning to one hard-hit community but gave dangerously short notice to another just downstream, highlighting a stark disparity in the agency's response.
The report also confirmed significant vacancies in the relevant NWS office during the flooding, though staff there told investigators such openings did not impact officials’ response. Democrats in Congress first sought the inquiry amid allegations that the Trump administration’s cuts to the federal workforce hampered local officials’ ability to respond.
Miles away, minutes apart
The report — initiated by the Department of Commerce Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in response to the Democrats’ requests and obtained by Scripps News on Friday — cited a breakdown in communication with local officials in Kerr County as the catastrophic flood on the Guadalupe River unfolded in the early morning hours of July 4, 2025, leading to what the report called "widespread and severe property damage, injury, and loss of life."
According to the OIG investigation, the NWS issued a Flash Flood Warning for the area around Hunt, Texas, at 1:14 a.m., providing an estimated 106-minute lead time before the river reached flood stage. However, for the city of Kerrville, just 9.5 miles downstream, the effective lead time was only 26 minutes, falling well short of the Service’s 65-minute performance goal.
And as the situation escalated, forecasters made multiple, unsuccessful calls to the Kerr County emergency management coordinator and the sheriff's office between 3:38 a.m. and 4:42 a.m., the report found. Unable to get “ground truth” from local officials, NWS staff took the rare step of upgrading the alert to a “Flash Flood Emergency” at 4:03 a.m., a designation for what the report calls an “exceedingly rare situation” involving a “severe threat to human life and catastrophic damage.”
One such emergency alert warned of “a large and deadly flood wave” moving down the river and urged residents: “This is a PARTICULARLY DANGEROUS SITUATION. SEEK HIGHER GROUND NOW!”
The OIG took direct issue with how the NWS calculates its success metrics, suggesting the decision to average warning times across a region “obscure[s] meaningful differences among communities and would not be representative of public experience.”
“Residents in one area may receive far less advance notice than those in another, yet the average would imply equivalent performance,” the report stated. “Location-specific reporting more accurately represents the warning experience the public actually receives.”
Staff underplay forecaster vacancies
In the wake of the flash flooding – resulting in the deaths of at least 135 people, including 37 children, the report found — some elected officials pointed to possible staffing shortages said to be caused by Trump administration cuts to the federal workforce as a reason for emergency officials’ poor response.
“Rather than working to make NWS stronger and more effective, the Trump Administration and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have focused on staffing and resource cuts that risk seriously jeopardizing NOAA and NWS’ capacity,” several Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee wrote in a letter requesting an OIG investigation into the incident. “Arbitrary cuts to vital services like NWS hurt emergency preparedness and put lives in danger.”
“[T]he vacancy rate at many NWS offices nationwide has roughly doubled since President Trump returned to office — due in part to a wave of early retirements encouraged by the administration and a freeze on hiring,” echoed Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in his own letter calling for a probe. “[W]e must do everything possible to provide answers as to why the community was not alerted sooner that dangerously high floodwaters were imminent.”
The Trump administration has maintained that the president’s changes to the workforce had no impact on the emergency response, and has attacked Democrats who are suggesting as much as playing politics.
“Blaming President Trump for these floods is a depraved lie, and it serves no purpose during this time of national mourning,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters shortly after the flooding last year.
The Austin/San Antonio NWS office was vacant six positions at the time of the flood, including the Lead Meteorologist and “Warning Coordination Meteorologist,” whose role was to “interface” between the forecasting office and local partners and execute public awareness programs to mitigate disaster impacts, the OIG investigation confirmed.
Three such positions — including the warning coordination role – were left vacant as a result of what the report dubbed “workforce optimization incentives,” programs established by the Trump administration to encourage federal employees to take early retirement. No risk assessment had been conducted as to the potential impact of such vacancies, the report noted.
Yet NWS staff told investigators the vacancies "did not affect their ability to forecast, issue flood alerts, and provide support to Kerr County officials and other core partners in response to the flash flood event."
Still, the report found NWS officials expressed concern that the lack of a full-time coordination meteorologist "could result in diminished engagement with core partners" over the long term. The warning coordination role was ultimately filled in November of 2025.
In a statement to Scripps News, Schumer said the OIG report "confirmed what we feared: DOGE gutted the National Weather Service, and unless these roles are filled, it puts people’s lives at greater risk."
"President Trump needs to stop making excuses and start taking responsibility. Reverse the DOGE cuts. Fully staff the National Weather Service. He needs to do it now — before the next storm, before the next flood, before the next family has to bury their child," he continued.
Representatives for the Oversight Committee Democrats did not immediately respond to Scripps News’ inquiries about the report.
