Harrison Mayhew was looking forward to spending his July 5 birthday weekend in San Marcos, TX, enjoying time with his parents and hanging out with friends.
But the Baylor University student’s anticipation turned to worry soon after he woke on the morning of July 4.
He overheard his parents talking about news that a Guadalupe River flood was devastating the hill country near Hunt, TX, a 90-minute drive northwest of San Antonio. Early reports said the river had crested as high as 30 feet, and more than 100 people were considered missing. Emergency officials were launching a major search and rescue operation.
Mayhew’s worry primarily was focused on concern for several friends, including his good friend Aidan Heartfield. The two had met as college freshmen and struck up a friendship upon learning they both had been Eagle Scouts in their teens.
Heartfield, he knew, was enjoying the July 4 weekend at his family’s second home, located near the Guadalupe River, with his girlfriend, Ella Cahill, and two others, Joyce Catherine Badon and Reese Manchaca.
Mayhew began checking social media and reaching out to friends for word on Heartfield and the girls, and was shaken when he received a text from a friend saying that Aidan had called his father at about 4:30 a.m. to report the home was flooding and to ask what to do. Contact had been lost after he handed the phone to Joyce Catherine, telling his father he had to rescue Ella and Reese, who had been washed away. Joyce Catherine, according to news reports, told Heartfield’s father to tell her parents she loved them. Then the line went dead.
A Mission to Honor a Missing Friend
As the hours of July 4 ticked by, Mayhew clung to the hope that Heartfield and the three young ladies would be found alive. His worry began to turn toward despair as the days went by without word from his friends. Mayhew began to wonder how he could do something to help the living affected by the flood and honor Heartfield and his legacy as a friend.
Team Rubicon came to mind. Mayhew had been impressed by the veteran-led nonprofit back in 2015 when its volunteers responded to assist property owners in his hometown of Wimberly, TX, after the devastating Blanco River flood, which had killed 12 and destroyed the Texas hill country town on Memorial Day weekend. By July 6, Mayhew had registered to become a Team Rubicon volunteer—or Greyshirt. He hoped he’d be called up to serve survivors of the Guadalupe River flood.
A Flood Survivor is Called to Hunt
In San Antonio, mother of eight and personal trainer, Ashley Hall, was also thinking about the floods and survivors. She knew a bit about what those who had been rescued from the waters were going through.
In 1990, Hall, then three years old, had been camping with family and tubing the Frio River when a flood happened. Her mother and brother had nearly drowned, and Hall’s had gotten caught in rapids and her life jacket was pulling her down. If it hadn’t been for a family picnicking on the banks of the Frio who saved her, Hall is certain she wouldn’t be here today.
That near-drowning was on her mind as the July 2025 floods swept through the Texas hill country and in the days after, but something else was calling her, too. Some sort of mission.
So, Hall decided she’d find a way to help however she could. On Saturday, July 12, she and dozens of others met up with the Hunt Volunteer Fire Department. Their tasks would be to lift a little weight from the search and rescue teams by assisting with debris removal and helping to identify, locate, and preserve memorabilia and other important documentation among the wreckage of the Guadalupe River flood debris.
Boots cinched tight, walkie-talkies in hand, Hall and a friend made their way into the devastation.
Standing Up for Guadalupe River Flood Operation, Hill Country Hope
Mayhew was in the area, too. On July 11, four days after the girls’ bodies had been found but with Heartfield still missing, the 22-year-old had been deployed on Team Rubicon’s disaster response operation, Hill Country Hope.
Arriving at Team Rubicon’s Forward Operating Base located at the Hunt middle school, Mayhew hadn’t known what to expect.
“I figured most of the volunteers were vets and I might not have much in common with anyone,” says the college senior.
But Mayhew found he was welcomed at the FOB and immediately integrated into his assigned strike team: a group of volunteers who would be mucking out homes and clearing flood debris for property owners.
Yet the grief was still raw. He was quiet as he went about the work. He told no one why he was there or who he was honoring with his service.
It wasn’t long before someone noticed his quietude, though. The operation’s Logistics Section Chief, Kevin Meislin, approached Mayhew, saying it seemed like he had something on his mind. He was checking in. Mayhew opened up about his loss and that he’d volunteered to honor his friends.
Subtly, gently, word began to spread among the other Greyshirts. Given that roughly 60% of Greyshirts are veterans, many understand the grief of losing a friend and the trauma such an experience can provoke. Meislin and the operation’s Incident Commander, Oscar Arauco, checked in on the new Greyshirt often.
Meanwhile, all that weekend, Mayhew and the other Greyshirts went about their work serving flood survivors.
“It felt good to be helping people who were in so much need,” Mayhew says. “It was therapy for me. It helped me process what had happened.”
A Discovery Among the Debris
On the other side of Hunt, Hall and a friend were digging through feet of flood debris near a home at the intersection of the North and South forks of the Guadalupe.
“Most of the Hunt store had washed up on her property and the post office too,” says Hall. There were overwhelming piles everywhere—trash was mixed in with wood and metal chairs. They found the Hunt sign for the post office that says ‘established 1942,’ as well as countless Amazon packages.
As the two worked a debris pile next to a shed, Hall’s friend pulled a piece of paper from the wreckage. It had gotten wet and dried again, but the importance was obvious. Here was a child’s drawing—a handprint turned into a turkey—set alongside his Thanksgiving poem.
It might not be a home deed, but the women knew it was valuable. Hall bagged the drawing in a water-safe bio bag and tucked it atop a “keep” pile. Whatever seemed important but didn’t belong to them, the homeowners said they’d get to the lost-and-found.
Even after they left the property, Hall couldn’t get the artwork out of her mind. She knew this childhood drawing, the name “Aidan” scrawled in crayon, would mean something to someone. She hoped it would somehow get returned to the family.
Across town, Mayhew was clearing mud and debris and also wondering if any of Heartfield’s personal belongings would ever be found and returned to his family.
Outside the Hunt Middle School, an Uncanny Connection is Made
Never mind the small army she had to run at home, Hall kept returning to Hunt. “I couldn’t stop thinking about that picture, but we got rained out. We couldn’t go do anything.” She was worried the picture wouldn’t make its way back to whoever Aidan was and his family.
On Monday, as rain fell on Hunt, Hall decided to post a picture of the drawing to her social feed. It was quickly shared on the Found on the Guadalupe River Facebook group, where Heartfield’s family and friends recognized it.
On Tuesday, Hall returned to Hunt, this time hoping to find someone who could help her get back on the property so she could help get the drawing back to the family. And still it was raining. As she waited for the weather to break, Hall headed toward the middle school to sit down and think, and passed a ring of Greyshirts.
“Y’all started talking about disaster cleanup, and I was like, ‘What?’ These are people that can get onto that property,” says Hall.
Hall didn’t know who the Greyshirts were, or what Team Rubicon was, but it was obvious they were headed out to do debris removal and help local homeowners. Hall sprang at them.
Would they be going anywhere near the intersection of the North and South Forks, she wanted to know, and could they please, please, look for this drawing if so? It was important; it needed to be returned to the family. Just look at this, she said, showing them the photo of the drawing, which belonged to a young man named Aidan. His body had been recovered just that Saturday—the same day as she’d found the drawing.
The Greyshirts didn’t know if they’d be going to the property, but they did know one thing: Someone among them knew Aidan.
A Keepsake from the Guadalupe River Flood Returns Home
Mayhew was out in the field serving flooding survivors when Hall stopped by the FOB, but as soon as he returned, Reed Christian, a Greyshirt with a background in social work who had become close with Mayhew during the operation, pulled him aside and told him about Hall and the drawing.
They knew that if Hall could help put the drawing in Mayhew’s hands, he could get it back to the family. So, with the permission of Arauco and the Greyshirts’ strike team leader, the Greyshirt friends set off to find her. Eventually, they made it to that property at the intersection of the North and South forks of the Guadalupe. By the time they arrived, Hall had managed to get in.
Standing at the gate to the property, Mayhew was wracked with emotion. If Aidan couldn’t be returned to his family, at least a small piece of him could be.
As the Guadalupe flowed brownly behind them, the impromptu volunteer handed the young Greyshirt the artwork. Then, they went their separate ways. Hall’s mission had been accomplished; Mayhew’s was still in progress: the next day, he would travel to San Antonio to hand the recovered drawing off to Aidan’s uncle.
The Mission Continues: Rebuilding What was Lost During the Floods
A week or so later, at Aidan’s celebration of life ceremony, Mayhew had a chance to speak with Heartfield’s parents. He recalls that they shared that they were deeply grateful for all he’d done to honor their son and get the artwork home.
As he thought of Heartfield, of his service with Team Rubicon, and of the uncanny coincidence that brought him and Hall together, Mayhew decided he would serve as a Greyshirt again when the need arises. He’d found a new way to be challenged—and to feel whole again.“I realized that the people on Team Rubicon that I had just met weren’t only focused on the job at hand, but that they also cared about me. I realized that I wasn’t simply part of a team focused only on the next task, but that I had joined a community that was there to support me during a very difficult time,” Mayhew said. “Knowing that others genuinely cared gave me the strength to carry on and channel my grief into helping others who had lost their livelihoods and begin the long and difficult process of rebuilding what was lost during the floods.”
