El Niño storms roll through La Cañada

As of early afternoon Wednesday, La Cañada had received nearly 3 inches of rainfall since a system of El Niño-related storms hit the California coast earlier this week.

Meanwhile, city and public safety officials have been diligently monitoring area streets and debris basins looking for potential signs of weather-related trouble and report that so far the city’s preparation efforts are holding up.

“City streets and catch basins have been operating well,” City Engineer Kris Markarian said in an email Wednesday afternoon. “County flood and road maintenance crews have been patrolling sensitive areas in the city and responding promptly.”

Early Tuesday, city officials worked with Southern California Edison to restore power to traffic signals on Foothill Boulevard, from La Cañada Boulevard to Angeles Crest Highway. Outages hit Descanso Gardens and Montrose at around 11 a.m., but power was restored in about an hour, confirmed SCE spokesman David Song.

Crew members from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works were seen Tuesday afternoon doing post-storm cleanup work at the Mullally debris basin off Manistee Drive, which bore the brunt of the 2010 post-Station fire mudslides. Nearby, residents rushed to fill sandbags, shoveling up free sand provided by the city even as rains fell.

La Cañada resident Alicia Herman brought nephew Alex Pineda to Haskell Street, one of three sites where bins were set up offering free sand and bags to residents, so he could help with the heavy lifting.

“We’re looking to block off a drain that gets covered by pine needles and usually causes a big backup,” Herman said Tuesday, estimating her need at 10 bags.

At Mayors Discovery Park, La Cañadan Lisa Kennedy scraped at sandy remains with a shovel edge, hoping refills would soon be coming.

“I’m worried the foundation of our house is going to be affected,” said the Crown Avenue resident. “I was hoping to get 25 (bags) filled, but I’m just going to luck out with 10 to 12 — it’s better than nothing.”

Markarian reported that, as of Wednesday, all three city sand and sandbag sites had been replenished and could be accessed by residents 24 hours a day.

Although light flooding took place on a vulnerable section of roadway on Chevy Chase Drive between Flintridge and Highland drives, Captain Bob Funke of Los Angeles County Fire Department’s Station 82, reported by and large, La Cañada was looking pretty good.

Two homes near Flintridge Sacred Heart Academy sustained damage Wednesday morning after the backyard of one residence flowed into the backyard of another on a street below.

Lisa Derderian, emergency management coordinator and spokeswoman for the Pasadena Fire Department, said at around 8 a.m., a resident living in the 500 block of St. Katherine Drive called to report a mud and debris flow in his yard that had come from a home on the 600 block of Wendover Road, above his property.

“The slope behind the house flowed, more than likely, due to oversaturation with the rain,” Derderian said Wednesday. “It compromised a retaining wall.”

The spokeswoman said the home on Wendover was unoccupied and is currently for sale. Neither of the residences were red tagged, and the residents on St. Katherine were allowed to remain on the property once it was deemed habitable by a building and safety inspector.

The owner of the unoccupied home, who will be responsible for repairing the retaining wall, was called and notified of the incident.

“There will be a lot of cleaning up to do there,” Derderian said.

Despite light flooding on a vulnerable section of roadway on Chevy Chase Drive between Flintridge and Highland drives, Capt. Bob Funke of Los Angeles County Fire Department’s Station 82 reported that by and large, La Cañada was looking pretty good.

“We’ve been monitoring everything on an hourly basis right now,” he said. “And everything’s running smoothly.”

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Sara Cardine, sara.cardine@latimes.com

Twitter: @SaraCardine