Gather Valuables : Residents in Slide Area Await Tests

With geologists saying it will be at least a week before they can determine the likelihood of more landslides, residents of some of the six San Clemente homes declared unsafe for occupancy after a slope collapsed Wednesday night returned to gather personal belongings Friday.

Late Friday, Beach Leighton of the Irvine geology firm of Leighton & Associates said there apparently had been no further slippage after the initial slide, which involved 120,000 cubic yards of earth.

The slide left the homes dangerously close to a vertical drop, and San Clemente Fire Chief Tom Dailey told their occupants to evacuate Thursday.

Earlier, it was reported by Leighton & Associates that seven homes were endangered, but one of them was removed from the list by city officials.

24-Hour Guard

The 200 block of Via Alegre has been blocked off to the public, and police and firefighters have been maintaining a 24-hour guard to prevent looting. The block overlooks the Shorecliff Golf Course, whose sixth fairway runs through a deep gorge behind the homes.

“Right now, it’s all a matter of time, the time it takes to get results from tests the geologists are making to determine the integrity of the soil,” said Jack Stubbs, San Clemente’s emergency planning officer. “It also is hoped that the tests will tell us what caused the landslide.”

During the slide, the patio of Nick and Danica Mallory’s home at 212 Via Alegre dropped about 20 feet, leaving the back wall of the house hanging over the escarpment. Friday morning, they returned to remove a number of valuables, taking them to the home of a neighbor, David McQueen, across the street.

Vacation Home

“This really is sort of our vacation home,” Mallory said. “Our permanent home is in Downey, but we do have some important stuff here, and if the house goes down the cliff, we want to be sure these things don’t go with it.”

Mallory, who said he has earthquake insurance, added that he is convinced the July 8 earthquake near Palm Springs and the July 13 temblor off Oceanside “had something to do with causing the landslide because we hadn’t had any problems before that.”

Down the street at 216 Via Alegre, Lee and Lu Hambleton were returning from the motel they had checked into after Dailey told residents along Via Alegre to leave Thursday.

Hambleton said he wasn’t sure where he and his wife would stay Friday night, but added, “We have this camper, and we might take it to a relative’s or to a park somewhere until we find out what’s going to happen to the house.”

Leighton & Associates was hired by the city to investigate possible damage to public property, such as the street and underground utility lines. Leighton said test holes will be drilled in the street, probably early next week, in a procedure that also could help determine the fate of the six homes that are between the street and the slide area.

Another geology firm, G.A. Nicoll & Associates of Tustin, has been hired by Estrella Properties Ltd., owners of the golf course and parts of the slopes running through it.

The chief engineer for that firm, Dr. Hugh Marley, said test holes will be drilled in the slopes and on the floor of the canyon as part of a field investigation, which also will include mapping the slope’s present profile.

Evacuees Could Be Out Week

“Preliminary data from these studies could be available by next Friday,” he said, “meaning that the evacuees could be out that long at least.”

On the bluff across the canyon from the raw scar left by the landslide, residents of another neighborhood fear that they might be next.

Dan Milligan, of 243 Via Ballena, said he and five of his neighbors “are concerned about earth movement because two of us have had problems with our brick chimneys cracking.”

One neighbor, he said, had his chimney torn down to keep it from falling down, “and I had mine reinforced with a wooden framework.”

“There is earth movement on our slope, which is on Estrella Properties land, and it must be stabilized,” he added. “Right now, we can’t sell or even borrow on our homes.”