Gusty Arctic Storm Floods Roads, Blacks Out Homes

An Arctic storm system swept into Southern California on Friday, unleashing torrents of rain and high winds that toppled power poles, flooded streets and generated heavy surf.

“We have reports of flooding in the streets. Some people have flooding in their homes,” said Sgt. Suzanne Hatcher, a spokeswoman for the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department.

She said flooding and electrical outages were reported in Fallbrook, Encinitas, Vista and Spring Valley--essentially all across the county.

Valley Center Road in Escondido was closed by a mud slide, the Sheriff’s Department reported.

In downtown San Diego, many intersections were flooded, as were the inside lanes of Harbor Drive. Driving downtown Friday night was “like navigating a boat,” one driver said.

There were reports of motorists trapped by high water, numerous traffic accidents and power outages affecting at least 20,000 customers.

Winds gusting at 20 to 40 m.p.h. caused power outages in Vista, San Marcos, La Jolla and North Park, San Diego Gas & Electric spokesman Fred Vaughn said.

“We had lines arcing and sparking, involving tree branches getting caught in wires and knocking down lines,” he said. “We haven’t had any reports of any major damage.” Repair crews and tree trimmers were expected to have lines repaired by early this morning, he said.

The Coast Guard reported that a 60-foot vessel had cut loose from its moorings in San Diego Bay and was bouncing up against the fishing pier at Shelter Island.

After sweeping through Los Angeles and Orange counties, the storm hit northern San Diego County about 8 p.m. and downtown about an hour later.

On Los Angeles County roads, the California Highway Patrol reported more than 200 rain-related accidents, including an incident that snarled the westbound Ventura Freeway and backed up traffic onto the San Diego Freeway for about 20 miles.

Santa Barbara Harbor Patrol and Coast Guard officials said 15-foot waves knocked seven boats from their moorings, beaching the vessels.

No deaths were reported, but the storm left tens of thousands of homes and businesses throughout the region without power.

“We had what I would consider almost a hurricane situation,” said Sgt. Kevin Mauch of the Malibu sheriff’s station. “The rain was actually driven horizontally, the wind was so fierce.”

Gusts of wind up to 35 m.p.h. were clocked at Los Angeles International Airport and 31 m.p.h. in Long Beach.

The winds and rain were dying down by 8 p.m., and power was largely restored to area homes.

Meteorologist Mike Smith of WeatherData, a private weather forecasting service, said the weather system should be in the deserts west of the Colorado River by this morning, bringing better weather to the Los Angeles Basin today.

Southern California Edison said 35,000 customers--mostly in the South Bay cities of Long Beach, Torrance and El Segundo--encountered some power outages. The Department of Water and Power said 15,500 homes throughout its service area in Los Angeles lost power because of downed lines.

The hardest-hit areas in Los Angeles County were Pacific Palisades, Beverly Hills, central Los Angeles, Highland Park, Mandeville Canyon, Wilmington and scattered San Fernando Valley areas in the northern part of the city.

The DWP said 28 crews were responding to downed wires and all power should be restored by morning.

Slides in Saugus

In Saugus, six inches of mud washed off hillsides onto some parts of San Francisquito Canyon Road, making the road impassable, the Los Angeles County Fire Department said. Firefighters put a sand-bag dike around the rear of one home near one of the slide areas as a precaution.

An oil-carrying tanker truck overturned on the westbound Ventura Freeway near Kanan Road at 4:18 p.m., spilling diesel fuel on the rain-slick road and blocking four lanes of traffic. Traffic was backed up for 20 miles onto the northbound San Diego Freeway.

Charlene Baldwin, a spokeswoman for Pacific Telephone, said there were no widespread outages of phone lines in the Los Angeles area, but numerous individual homeowners had complained about lost service because of the rain.

‘Having Problems’

“During the dry season the lines to homes sometimes get cracks in them, and when you have a big rain like this you get leaks into those lines, so some people are having problems,” she said.

In Orange County, thundershowers packing powerful winds triggered dozens of accidents, including a head-on collision that shut down a four-mile stretch of Pacific Coast Highway between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach.

Police in Westminster reported that winds gusting up to 60 m.p.h. damaged 40 mobile homes about 7:45 p.m. Residents of the mobile home park in the 9700 block of Bolsa Avenue were evacuated as a precautionary measure.

“There’s glass everywhere,” a Westminster fire dispatcher said. “It looks like a powerful wind tore through there.”

Inch an Hour

At one point, the rain was falling at the rate of one inch an hour at John Wayne Airport in Orange County. By 8 p.m., however, only .40 of an inch had fallen.

In Laguna Beach, police reported several dozen eucalyptus trees were toppled by the strong winds. “In some places it looks like the wind treated the trees like match sticks,” Sgt. Danell Adams said.

WeatherData’s Smith said the fast-moving front brought particularly heavy rains between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m., when .64 of an inch of rain fell at Los Angeles International Airport.

In Long Beach, .74 of an inch fell by 7 p.m., nearly all of it in the previous three-hour period.