3 Killed as Cold Storm Lashes Area

The second significant storm in a week sloshed through California’s open “storm door” Tuesday evening and early Wednesday, causing the deaths of three people in an Orange County crash, spawning a small tornado in Pico Rivera, and dumping snow in some low-lying areas.

Snow fell as low as 2,000 feet in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, in the Antelope Valley, the Tehachapi and San Bernardino mountain ranges and in Orange County.

As the upper-level cold front moved eastward, meteorologist Rick Dittmann of WeatherData Inc., which provides forecasts for The Times, predicted “generally unsettled” conditions for the rest of the week, with a slight chance of showers through Saturday.

Cold rain fell in torrents at times, slowing traffic on slick freeways and streets.

Three people died on the Santa Ana Freeway in Irvine early Wednesday, the California Highway Patrol said, when the driver of a van apparently lost control in a downpour and struck a guardrail. The three occupants of the van were killed when a truck smashed into it from the rear.

The CHP identified the van driver as Wayne Wonhyung Yoo, 29, and his passengers as Suk Yong Yoo, 25, and Au Dong Park, 55.

The truck driver was not hurt.

“It was raining heavily and visibility was low,” said CHP spokesman Keith Thornhill. “The truck was driving along and apparently wasn’t able to see the van.”

Shortly after 9 p.m. Tuesday a small tornado swept at treetop height along a two-tenths-of-a-mile path in Pico Rivera.

No one was hurt, but the rare twister caused thousands of dollars in damage as it ripped through a two-block section of Zola Avenue.

Eric Carlos, 19, said he watched helplessly from his front door as trees were uprooted and neighbors’ cars were crushed. He said the tornado sounded like a caravan of trucks driving through the neighborhood at full speed.

To Steve Lister, who lives in the 5600 block of Zola Avenue, the rumbling wind resembled an earthquake. As his house began to shake, Lister said, “I ran outside. I could see the wind swirling around my back yard, throwing lawn furniture six feet into the air.”

The powerful winds damaged the roofs of three homes and smashed two cars, broke a window, downed power lines, uprooted trees and sent roof shingles flying hundreds of feet. Shortly before 5 p.m. Wednesday, lightning from a fierce thunderstorm struck a 30-foot palm tree in Hacienda Heights, blasting out the windows of homes in the 16000 block of East Binney Avenue.

At Elodia Reyes’ home, furniture was knocked over, walls were covered with soot and the phone went dead, according to a neighbor, Marilyn McIntyre, 51, a schoolteacher who lives across the street. Reyes, a friend and two children were in the home, but no one was hurt.

“It was a beautiful, sunny day until about 5 p.m.,” McIntyre said in a telephone interview. “It started raining and then there were these flashes of lightning. We thought the entire house blew up, but the lightning just hit their tree.

“Five windows in the front of our house got blown to smithereens. There was glass everywhere. The kitchen sink was full of it.”

Snow and ice forced brief closure of the Antelope Valley Freeway on Wednesday morning. The weather was blamed for 16 traffic accidents in less than an hour in that area, including a 10-car pileup during morning commuting hours. No serious injuries were reported, but the CHP reported that tangled cars littered a five-mile stretch of the freeway, which was closed from Angeles Forest Highway north to Palmdale Boulevard.

“We started getting snow at 5:15 a.m.,” said CHP Officer Miguel Siordia. “People started crashing by 6. They were driving too fast for the conditions.”

In the San Bernardino Mountains, four schools in the Rim-of-the-World Unified School District and five in the Bear Valley Unified School District were closed for the day because of heavy snow.

Big Bear Lake reported eight to 12 inches of new snow, and a foot to a foot and a half of snow was on the ground at Lake Arrowhead.

In Orange County, snow fell in Rancho Santa Margarita, Trabuco Canyon and other low-lying areas. Cold rain fell in torrents and on Wednesday afternoon hail--accompanied by frequent bursts of thunder and lightning--pounded some areas.

The storm dropped 0.26 of an inch of rain at the Los Angeles Civic Center overnight, bringing the season’s total to 2.17 inches, still more than four inches below the 6.32 inches that would be normal for the date.

Other areas received greater amounts--including 0.37 at Los Angeles International Airport and 0.57 in Anaheim. Elsewhere, Pasadena recorded 0.63 and San Juan Capistrano had 0.75.

Pea-sized hail pounded La Verne in the eastern San Gabriel Valley on Wednesday morning, lasting about 15 minutes, Police Sgt. Randy Latham said. Three inches of it accumulated at Foothill Boulevard and Wheeler Avenue, slowing traffic, he said.

In San Diego County, more than a foot of snow fell in the local mountains, and about half an inch of rain doused Lindbergh Field. A heavy hailstorm pelted Chula Vista about 8 a.m. and another blanketed the top of Mt. Helix before noon.

“With the storm, we’ve gotten reports of snow, hail, funnel clouds, waterspouts and very, very cold temperatures,” National Weather Service forecaster Wilbur Shigehara said in San Diego.

Schools in Julian and the Mountain Empire Unified School District were closed Wednesday because of snow-clogged roads.

The cold weather brought the opening of shelters for the homeless in Los Angeles and San Diego.

Meteorologist Dittmann said Southern Californians can expect cool temperatures for the next few nights, especially in the inland valleys, with nighttime lows possibly in the 20s in Riverside, Beaumont, Ontario and Woodland Hills.

Wednesday’s high at the Civic Center was 57 degrees. Relative humidity ranged from 43% to 90%.

Dittmann said it was an “iffy” call as to whether another major storm may ride the jet stream south from a thousand miles out in the Pacific and reach rain-hungry California soon. But he noted that a southern branch of the jet stream is still passing along the West Coast before heading eastward over Baja California, a vital element in opening the way for Pacific storms to move toward California.

Times staff writers Tina Daunt and Michael Connelly in Los Angeles County, Davan Maharaj in Orange County and Caroline Lemke in San Diego County contributed to this story.

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