A series of atmospheric rivers swept through the state on Thursday, flooding California’s roads with heavy rain and bringing much-needed snow to the mountains.
The storm first hit the San Francisco Bay Area on Wednesday before concentrating in the southern and eastern parts of the state, where it suspended cable car service.
Heavy rain arrived in Southern California on Thursday in time to disrupt the morning commute.
National Weather Service forecaster Bob Oravec said atmospheric rivers, long bands of moisture that form over the Pacific Ocean, are driving the storms that dumped heavy rain on the Los Angeles and San Diego areas.
Atmospheric rivers “typically occur before a cold front moves across the Pacific,” he said. “And when you give it the topography and influence of the West Coast, you often get very heavy rain, not just along the coastal mountains, but also inland through the Sierra Nevada.”
As rain poured down in San Diego, Ruben Gomez spent Thursday cleaning debris from storm drains in his parents’ neighborhood.
He piled sandbags around the remains of a house that had been badly damaged by flooding from an earlier deluge.
Firefighters had to extricate the parents, both 82 years old, from their home after a recent storm flooded them with water up to 6 feet high.
The father was hospitalized for two days due to hypothermia, and the mother was hospitalized for a week with water in one of her lungs.
“We plugged every hole in the house with plastic and paper to keep the water from getting that high again,” he said.
They do not have insurance and rely on donations from family, friends and neighbors.
He said he remains grateful that his parents survived and are now living safely in their home in an area with less risk of flooding.
Last winter, California suffered from numerous drought-destroying atmospheric rivers that caused massive flooding, massive waves that overwhelmed coastal communities, and extreme snowfall that crushed buildings. More than 20 people died.
Forecasters said this week’s “Pineapple Express” (so called because its plumes of moisture stretched across the Pacific Ocean to near Hawaii) will be followed by an even more powerful storm on Sunday.
The California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services activated its operations center and deployed personnel and equipment to the most at-risk areas.
Brian Ferguson, the department’s deputy director of crisis communications, characterized the situation as a “serious threat to the safety of Californians.”
He said areas from the Oregon border south to San Diego, from the coast to the mountains, could be affected over the next 10 to 14 days.
“This is just a wide swath of California, and it’s going to be a threat over the next week,” Ferguson said.
A 100-foot-tall sequoia tree fell in the Silicon Valley city of Saratoga on Wednesday, striking a car and trapping a girl inside, according to KNTV.
He was rescued by firefighters with only minor injuries.
“We were very lucky,” Santa Clara County Fire Department Capt. Matt Mokhtarian told the television station. “It’s only a few feet in this scenario.”
Flash flooding hit much of southern Los Angeles County on Thursday.
Vehicles were forced to plow through water on low-lying sections of the highway, and at least one underpass beneath a railroad crossing in Long Beach flooded, submerging cars.
Flooding along Pacific Coast Highway in Seal Beach, south of Los Angeles, temporarily closed part of the highway on Thursday, leaving a white van stuck at an intersection.
Near Costa Mesa, whitewater rescue teams pulled people from storm-flowing channels.
The Orange County Fire Department said in a social media post that the man was taken to a hospital in stable condition.
Fire officials also rescued a man trapped on an islet in the Santa Ana Riverbed surrounded by rushing water.
Paramedics had to use a helicopter to lift the man to safety.
Mammoth Mountain Ski Resort in the Sierra Nevada Mountains reported 12 to 14 inches of snow overnight.
Earlier this week, state officials reported that the critical Sierra Nevada snowpack, which normally supplies about 30% of California’s water, was well below normal.
Heavy snow was also reported in the mountains east of Los Angeles.
A winter storm warning is in effect until Friday morning for about 300 miles of the Sierra Nevada, from north of Lake Tahoe to south of Yosemite National Park, the National Weather Service in Reno, Nevada said.
Forecasters said some areas could see snow falling at a rate of up to 2 inches per hour and winds of up to 160 mph.
A second atmospheric river is expected to move in late Saturday, already predicted to become the “largest storm of the season,” according to the National Weather Service.
The worst part of the storm is expected to develop late Sunday into Monday as it stalls over Point Conception in Santa Barbara County.
“This system could bring continued rain for 24 to 36 hours (or more),” the Bureau of Meteorology said in a forecast update Thursday.
Heavy rain is then expected from Monday into Wednesday, with snow expected in higher elevations, which could cause landslides and dangerous flooding.
