Posted on 01/10/2005 6:42:33 PM PST by kattracks
LA CONCHITA, Calif. - A huge mudslide crashed down on homes in a coastal hamlet with terrifying force Monday, killing at least one person and leaving up to 12 missing as a Pacific storm hammered Southern California for a fourth straight day. Ventura County Fire Department Chief Bob Roper said at least six and as many as a dozen residents were missing in the mudslide that pummeled a four-block area of homes in tiny La Conchita, about 70 miles northwest of Los Angeles. Nine people were injured, including a 60-year-old man who was buried for three hours.
"It lasted a long time. It was slow-moving. The roofs of the houses were crashing and creaking real loud and there was a huge rumble sound," said Robert Cardoza, a construction worker who was clearing debris from a nearby highway.
The mudslide brought the number of dead from the latest wave of California storms to 10. The storms have sent rainfall totals to astonishing levels, turning normally mild Southern California into a giant flood zone.
The hillside in La Conchita cascaded down like a brown river as authorities were evacuating about 200 residents from the area. Trees and vegetation were carried away, leaving huge gashes of raw earth on the bluff.
Some residents made their way from the area clutching pets, luggage or clothing as the huge mass of mud bore down. Some huddled together or cried as they talked on cell phones. Fifteen to 20 houses were hit by the slide.
Rescuers dropped listening devices into the rubble to try to locate victims before another downpour of up to 2 inches of rain was expected before dawn Tuesday.
La Conchita is a slip of a town pressed between a highway and a towering coastal bluff. Several houses were damaged by a mudslide here during powerful storms in the 1990s.
The destruction at La Conchita was the worst disaster of the storms to date, but mudslides and flooding were reported throughout the region, blocking road and rail travel and forcing a shutdown of interstate petroleum supply lines.
The death toll also includes a 2-year-old girl who slipped from her mother's grasp as rescuers tried to hoist them from a car submerged on a road outside Los Angeles. Avalanches killed two people in Utah and one in Nevada — a 13-year-old snowboarder who was swept off a ski lift to his death.
From the start of the latest dose of violent weather on Friday through midday Monday, several mountainous areas in Southern California had recorded more than 20 inches of rain, including 26 inches in Nordhoff Ridge in the Ventura County mountains.
The rain came on the heels of stormy weather that blasted the state earlier last week.
The average amount of winter rainfall in downtown Los Angeles is 15 inches, but about 21 inches had fallen as of Monday, including a Jan. 9 record of 2.6 inches, said National Weather Service (news - web sites) meteorologist Bruce Rockwell.
"I've never seen such a sustained event like this," Rockwell said.
The heavy rainfall was being generated by a sluggish low-pressure system rotating off California and drawing a flow of moisture known as a "Pineapple Express" up from the subtropical Pacific near Hawaii.
To the north in the Sierra Nevada, the storm produced heavy snow during the weekend that stalled an Amtrak train, shut down the airport at Reno, Nev., for the second time in a week, and halted highway travel across the mountain range.
Since Dec. 28, up to 19 feet of snow has fallen at elevations above 7,000 feet in the Sierra Nevada, with 6 1/2 feet at lower elevations in the Reno area. Meteorologists said it was the most snow the Reno-Lake Tahoe area has seen since 1916.
The commuter link between Reno and Carson City was closed Sunday by whiteout conditions as wind swept down from the Sierra. With visibility sharply reduced, at least 40 vehicles, including three Nevada Highway Patrol cruisers, skidded into snow drifts, ditches and each other. National Guard members used Humvees to pick up the stuck motorists.
"We're talking real ugly conditions. In 12 years with the NHP I've never seen conditions that bad," Trooper Jeff Bowers said.
The train of storms that have slammed into California also have spread rain, snow and ice eastward across the nation.
The storms have piled up 10 feet of snow in the Rockies, where three skiers on a family outing were reported missing Monday.
Four snowmobilers were stranded overnight near Steamboat Springs, Colo., after they got stuck. None was injured, but they considered themselves lucky to get out alive Sunday morning.
Jesse Goble and his brother-in-law started a fire with a stick they saturated in gasoline and lit from a spark plug on one of their machines. They spent the night cutting up a dead tree to feed the flames, sharing a single water bottle with melted snow and four Snickers bars.
"We were fortunate that it was 20 degrees and mostly clear," Goble said. "A few things different, it would have been a whole different story."
Last week's heavy rain and snow also produced flooding along the Ohio River that has affected communities in West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana, covering riverside roads and forcing some residents to evacuate. One person died Monday in Ohio when he drove into high water.
Tens of thousands remained without power.
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Associated Press Writers Tom Gardner, Jeff Wilson, Gillian Flaccus and Daisy Nguyen contributed to this story.
This is unimaginable. Mother nature is a little angry or something.
:(
This is about 10 miles south of me. The slide has been coming for years. Sorry to say this, but anyone who had this happen to them could have seen in coming a mile off. I am sorry for the folks who lost their homes, etc., but this one was a NO BRAINER. The hill is right on top of the homes and has slumped before. I can't figure out how to post it, but I have a picture from one of the guys at work showing the road washed out. Any suggestions?
Mother Nature not to happy lately...
I am going to light a candle in church tomorrow for all these poor people.
Good memories of La Conchita. Used to tag along with my older sister in '74 as she was taking surfing lessons there on that beach.
Sadly, remember the mudslide 10 years ago. My heart, and prayers go to the good folks of that town now.
Would be interested if any Federal money was used in rebuilding after the last one.
There are many portions of California just not meant to have houses. It's a geologically young and seismically active environment with steep slopes, and a fire and flood problem exacerbating that. It's not like there isn't enough room in the country to build where you're either not going to be on a landslide or under one.
You know I listened to this idiot weatherman today that said Oh the Hurricaines in Fkorida, this past year the Tsunamis and the heavy rain in the west is normal this is not strange wether or whacky weather or global warming it's Just normal? Who let him out of the Camarillo State Hospital?
Methinks Chicken Little hatched out a whole brood of little "chicken littles."
Amen. It is like building in a flood plain, 100 feet from the Mississippi. DUMB.
It should be a great little beachfront campsite. Not a town.
I was thinking the same thing. Like "not again." It's happened before, and not that long ago. Is the real-estate somewhat "more" affordable (for beachfront property) there or something?
(for obvious reasons?)
If, in fact, these homeowners were aware of the historical danger of living there, I would then elevate their prudence to those who live in unsecured mobile homes in tornado country. Duh.
Just damn. I'm supposed to be headed back to the Los Angeles area tomorrow from the high desert, but now it looks like the darn thing isn't moving out until friday.
You know, its a great concept. Tiny beach town. Everyone knows everyone else. Beautiful views and walk to the beach. The flip side is that the mountain is just waiting to fall on your head. Its a DUH moment. Entirely foreseeable. This has happened before, so it is no surprise to ANYONE.
Oh my God, what a picture. You do realize that the idiots in charge seeded the clouds several months ago. The last time they did this, the same thing happened. Massive flooding...
And does anyone wonder why our homeowner insurance rates keep climbing?
This has absolutely NOTHING to do with cloud seeding, if in fact there was any.
Any clouds seeded "months ago" currently don't exist and any water vapor that was in those clouds is likely over Siberia or India or somewhere.
Cloud seeding works immediately. It's localized.
The current rain in CA is caused by a very large-scale pattern basically impervious to trivialities like cloud-seeding.
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