u/PureImagination1921

Just stop. If you absolutely must violate the ban, do it in a large parking lot NOT in the high-risk fire zone.


Like many here, I've been very perplexed about the reactions of Britt and Richard (Jr.) Eastland that early morning of July 4. There have been other threads touching on this. However, I still can't make sense of this. What can possibly be going on with them to explain the following (summarized briefly from the official investigation report and hearings)?

Richard's wife was swept away out of a building (or just outside the building) farther upstream from Camp Mystic. She let him know that she survived a harrowing, life-threatening situation where she easily could have drowned. Richard received this message, we're not sure what he said back to his wife, and then he tries to go back to sleep. He looks outside, takes a shower, and (at least according to the official record), doesn't contact anyone in his family on the Guadalupe to see if they're OK. He has daughters asleep at Camp Mystic on the Flats. We don't have further information about whether his wife continued to try to contact him or her daughters at Mystic. 

Britt was on the Camp Mystic Cypress Lake side. According to the report and his own hearing testimony, he was awake and monitoring the situation at Cypress Lake, including checking on the cabins. So far, so good. However, he hears the radio transmissions where Francis Blackwell is swept away and doesn't call for help. His own mother and sister-in-law and her kids come up the road to him evacuating on foot and he doesn't call for help. He hears his father's last, desperate transmission from his Chevy Tahoe packed with Bubble Inn girls and doesn't respond to either his father or call for help. 

(Of course, this is in addition to the long-baffling information we've had about how Tweety and Mary Liz Eastland saved themselves and their grandchildren/children and didn't call for help at any point, despite being fully aware that the flooding was at a dire level because they were personally forced to flee on foot.)

So...what is psychologically wrong here? Normally these kinds of reaction would point to some kind of catatonia/feeling frozen due to trauma, but I don't think that can apply here since Britt and Richard still did complete some activities - Richard was shaving, Britt was at Cypress Lake doing SOMETHING to check on girls there. They weren't huddled in a corner unable to move. Why on earth would they respond in this completely perplexing way?

In an ideal world, they would have been fully prepared for emergencies and immediately enacted a rehearsed plan of action, including calling for reinforcements. In a more realistic world, we would probably expect them to panic a bit and make some frantic calls while trying to figure out what to do. However, I can't think of ANY explanation, short of something that seems less likely like being completely inebriated or having significant cognitive impairment, that makes sense for how they actually acted. Why would Richard not freak out that his wife almost drowned when his daughters were still downstream? How could Britt hear his father's last radio transmission and just carry on driving around Cypress Lake? Is it possible that they DID react in a normal way and the investigation somehow missed it? Did they try to say “I’m calling for help, Dad” and it wasn’t recorded in the report?

There’s a lot to get through in this article, Mystic and Kerr County overall.

We had an inspection in a crawl space related to the HVAC system. The guy said one pipe contains intact asbestos covering (not sure of the technical term) but it’s been removed from the others that were easier to access. We have no idea when this work was done or if it was done officially because there doesn’t seem to be a permit for it. The guy recommended encapsulating the single pipe and gave a cheap quote for doing it on the spot. No mention was made of permits; he did say full remediation is a large and complex job with specialized contractors.

Two concerns:

Should we do further asbestos testing given that we don’t know exactly what happened with these other pipes? Is it possible the whole crawl space is fucked and has been for years? It was built in ‘77.

Is it legit to encapsulate a single pipe? Does this also require a specialized contractor?

There is so much online about this that we don’t even know where to start.

ETA: the pipe is directly behind the bathroom vent. A little close for comfort.

We know a few things from the testimony and evidence to date:

- Two summer employees, Katherine Ferruzzo and Chloe Childress, were killed on July 4. Dick Eastland, a permanent employee, was also killed. 

- At least one employee, Francis Blackwell-Loper, was significantly injured on July 4. 

- 25 campers, not including Katherine and Chloe, were killed on July 4. 

- There may have been additional injuries. Dr. Julie Sprunt testified yesterday that she was called on to perform medical examinations (assessing for concussion, etc.) for girls who survived the floods. She didn't say (to my knowledge) that she found any injuries, but considering that girls were subjected to fast-flowing water full of contaminants and debris, it's certainly a strong possibility.

Employers are required to report employee deaths to OSHA within 8 hours and certain serious injuries (including hospitalization) within 24. Camper deaths must be reported to TX DSHS within 24 hours. There are substantial penalties for non-compliance on both sides: 

- For OSHA, the penalties vary depending on the severity of the violation and whether the failure to report is "willful": https://www.osha.gov/penalties. The basic fine for a serious violation is $16,550 per violation and the "willful or repeated" penalty amount is $165,514 per violation. For the three employees who died and Francis Blackwell, who was injured badly enough to go to the hospital (although I'm not sure if she was admitted), Mystic should be looking at a minimum penalty fine of $66,200 and a maximum of $662,056.

- For TX DSHS, another poster pulled up the relevant administrative code and found that the fines for failing to report a death can go up to $1,000 per day, per violation, in addition to license revocation. From July 5 to present at 25 camper deaths and assuming the full $1,000 fine, that's 299 days without reporting at $25,000 per day in penalties, so $7,475,000 and counting.

So...why hasn't Mystic reported? We know of the general incompetence, willful disregard for regulations, and so on - but why aren't the financial penalties motivating? The fines from DSHS alone are close to equaling annual revenue. Mystic has been asked and reminded multiple times about its duty to report, so the Eastlands can't claim they didn't know. What is going on here? For the OSHA side, is it possible that there was something fishy going on with the employee paperwork (i.e., getting paid under the table or something) that would make Mystic hesitant to report?