Encino home on verge of sliding into others

A hilltop Encino home on a street of million-dollar residences split in two overnight and is threatening to slide into neighboring houses this morning, authorities said.

The foundation of the house, which was unoccupied and undergoing renovations, apparently cracked last night after flooding in 15000 block of Skytop Road that may have been caused by groundwater saturation, city officials said.

Four homes below the damaged property are in danger, fire officials said, and two have been red-tagged, meaning no one is allowed back inside.

“Because of the instability of the water source and the weight of the home, the whole hillside is unstable right now,” said Los Angeles City Fire Department spokeswoman d’Lisa Davies.

Fire department officials discovered the damage to the structure after getting a report at about 10 p.m. Sunday of flooding on the street. Authorities late last night reported the source of the flooding as a possible water main break but said today that they had found no evidence of that at the scene.

Department of Water and Power officials said this morning that the flooding may have been caused by groundwater from recent rains.

“There was no water coming out of any of our structures last night,” said department spokesman Joe Ramallo.

By this morning, officials had marked the home with yellow, orange and green paint and placed sticks at various markers to try to determine how fast the structure was sliding.

Last night, fire officials arrived shortly after 10 p.m. to find the single-story home with cracks down the center of the roof, Davies said.

On the hilly street, this morning a hole in the foundation was visible under what appeared to be the dining room, where a crystal chandelier still hung intact from the ceiling. A red sign on a tree outside the home read: “Unsafe to occupy due to slope failure.”

Earlier this morning, loud cracking could be heard as part of the house shifted several feet toward the front driveway. Most of the sliding happened between 6 p.m. and midnight last night, said fire department Capt. Armando Hogan.

Traffic was closed off on the cul-de-sac in an attempt to limit vibration that could further destabilize the hill, Hogan said.

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