Lightning, Hail Pummel Southland : Storms Leave 10,500 County Homes Without Electricity

A swiftly moving band of thundershowers sprinted through Southern California late Tuesday afternoon, hurling lightning bolts that injured six farm workers near Carlsbad, knocking out power to more than 10,500 Orange County homes, interrupting the Angels-Brewers game in Anaheim and pelting several areas with wind, rain and hail.

Westminster and Huntington Beach suffered power outages after lightning struck poles and trees, according to fire officials, and residents of Anaheim, Orange, Stanton and Garden Grove called in reports of downed wires.

However, most of the nearly 100 Orange County calls received by 8 p.m. regarding lightning strikes centered in an area around La Palma and Cypress, fire officials added. No injuries were reported, police said.

Another power failure attributed to the storm knocked out most of the lights at Anaheim Stadium in the bottom of the fourth inning. Authorities said power was restored 15 minutes later.

Los Angeles Civic Center got its first measurable rainfall of the season--.10 of an inch by 9 p.m.--and thunder continued to rumble from time to time as the evening hours passed.

2 Taken to Medical Center

Elsewhere, however, the storm did more than rumble:

Carlsbad firefighters said six men were injured when lightning struck the earth a few feet from catering trucks serving snacks to farm workers at a tomato farm in northern San Diego County.

None of the six were actually struck by the lightning, Carlsbad Fire Capt. Cody Osburn said, and all were conscious when rescue units arrived. But two men were taken by helicopter to the burn unit at the UC San Diego Medical Center, where they were reported in fair condition. Two of the less seriously hurt were treated at Carlsbad hospitals, while the remaining two were hospitalized for observation.

In Orange County, thunderstorms and lightning between 5:30 and 6 p.m. affected six electrical circuits, interrupting power in areas including Yorba Linda, La Palma, Cypress, Buena Park and Garden Grove, according to Southern California Edison Co. spokesman Ken Bellis. Power was expected to be restored by 1 a.m. today to about one-third of the more than 10,500 affected homes--if no additional problems developed--and to all the homes by this morning, Bellis said late Tuesday.

Edison workers “will be working through the night until all repairs are made,” Bellis said. “These are the nights that are not a lot of fun.”

Bellis cautioned citizens to “stay clear” of any wires on the ground and report their locations to the Edison Co. or the police.

Winds gusting to 40 m.p.h. and hailstones the size of large peas were reported Tuesday in Palm Springs, Palm Desert and Rancho Mirage, where some streets were flooded for a time and an unofficial rain gauge in the vicinity recorded .23 of an inch of rain in just 30 minutes.

Riverside County sheriff’s deputies said a dozen homes in Rancho Mirage and Palm Desert reported floors covered by water during the brief deluge, but the flooding receded quickly. There was no immediate dollar estimate of damage.

A total of 1.55 inches of rain and a blanket of marble-size hailstones fell in an hour at Mt. Laguna in San Diego County, but there were no reports of damage.

Most of the town of South Pasadena was without electricity early in the evening, when lightning struck a guy wire leading to an Edison power line, causing an arc that overloaded the system.

In addition to the blackout of business establishments and residences, street lights and traffic lights were out of commission for several hours, and police directed traffic by hand at major intersections.

20,000 Customers

In all, Edison reported that about 20,000 customers were blacked out during the night--10,000 of them in the East Los Angeles-Whittier-South Pasadena area of Los Angeles County, while the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power said it had about 1,000 individual, isolated failures.

Other lightning strikes were reported in Highland Park and West Los Angeles, but police said no major damage resulted.

A flash-flood watch was in effect for the deserts and mountains of Southern California through most of the early evening Tuesday.

The unusual weather was the result of an upper level low-pressure center that formed off the coast of California and brought moisture and warm temperatures to the area, according to meteorologist Chris Landsea of the National Weather Service.

The National Weather Service said skies should be fair again by this morning, but the threat of new storms remains because of a continued flow of moist, unstable tropical air moving north from Mexico.

High temperature at Los Angeles Civic Center on Tuesday was 83 degrees, with relative humidity ranging from 51% to 87%, and forecasters said it should be about the same today.