Overview

• On July 4, USGS-connected sensors and manual triggers activated Comfort’s sirens to warn residents of rising floodwaters, enabling evacuations that led to zero deaths
• Daily noon tests and public education ensured residents recognized the long, flat siren tone as a flood warning and took prompt action when alarms sounded
• Volunteer firefighters conducted street-to-street alerts and have been searching the Guadalupe River for missing individuals, recovering at least one body as water levels recede
• The sirens spared Comfort any fatalities while upstream Kerr County, which had no comparable warning system, recorded at least 118 deaths in the same flood
• Officials and funders are reviewing proposals to add a third siren to expand coverage and strengthen the community’s preparedness for future floods