Storm Tangles Roads, Fails to Dent Drought

The strongest rainstorm of the season ambled into Southern California from the Pacific southwest of Los Angeles on Thursday, dropping desperately needed rain on the region, snarling commuter traffic on the freeways and creating deadly driving conditions on wet roadways.

Three people were killed and two others were critically injured on rain-slick Pearblossom Highway near Hampel Avenue in Antelope Valley in a late-morning accident involving three cars and and an empty big-rig truck, which jackknifed.

The California Highway Patrol reported that Fernando Danao, 50, of Castaic, died at the scene and that Alan Jelli, 36, of Little Rock died at Palmdale Medical Center. The name of an 18-year-old woman also killed was not released.

Welcome as the rain was to Southland residents, it was expected to have little, if any, effect on the long-term prospects of the water needs of drought-bound California.

“We’re happy to see it, “ State Drought Center spokesman Dean Thompson said Thursday in Sacramento. “We wish there were a bunch of them coming. But, by itself, we don’t expect it to last long enough to be of any significant benefit as far as the drought is concerned.

“We’re far behind. Hopefully, this is the first step in catching up, but we don’t see any steps following it.”

Illustrating just how serious the problem is, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power announced Thursday that because water consumption in the city failed to decrease 10% for the third consecutive month, it will ask the mayor and City Council on Feb. 1 to adopt mandatory rationing as required under Phase II of the city’s water conservation plan.

The only thing that will affect that request, officials said, is a dramatic change in the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada, where the city gets 80% of its water. The chances of that happening are scant, they said.

Meteorologist Steve Burback of WeatherData Inc., which provides forecasts for The Times, expected the warm, wet storm system to spread rain and showers over a widespread area through the night and then move east late today.

Because the storm is warm, Burback said, virtually all of its moisture was likely to fall as rain, with prospects of snow only above about 8,000 feet in the local mountains. Generally sunny weather is expected for the weekend, he said.

By late Thursday, 0.48 of an inch of rain had fallen at the Los Angeles Civic Center, more than twice the 0.21 of an inch recorded since July 1, but far short of about 4.5 inches that would be normal for this time of year.

Los Angeles International Airport had recorded 0.50 of an inch by late afternoon, the latest figures that were available; Culver City 0.60; Long Beach 0.52; Monrovia 0.61; San Bernardino 0.65; Newport Beach 0.31; Big Bear Lake 0.81 and Mt. Wilson 0.98.

As usual on the first day of a heavy rain, traffic was snarled on Metropolitan Los Angeles freeways. The CHP blamed motorists who drove too fast and followed too close on wet roadways.

Troubles for commuters started early in the southbound lanes of the Golden State Freeway in Sylmar when several big rigs tangled in the truck-bypass lanes. All lanes of the freeway were closed to clean up several bags of sodium nitrate spilled by one of the trucks.

As a result, traffic was backed up several miles on the Antelope Valley Freeway, which feeds into the Golden State, the CHP said.

In another freeway closure, the eastbound lanes of the San Bernardino were blocked in the City Terrace area for several hours by a spill of methyl bromide blamed on a routine traffic accident shortly before 11 a.m. east of Soto Street.

A truck spilled bottles of the fumigant across all eastbound lanes of the freeway. The CHP ordered all lanes and nearby on-ramps and transition roads closed until shortly after 6 p.m. Traffic was detoured while firefighters and Caltrans workers cleaned up the spill.

The CHP also reported that two lanes of the northbound Harbor Freeway were flooded north of Rosecrans Boulevard to 135th Street, forcing closure of the lanes for several hours.

And, the Los Angeles Fire Department said seven children and adults were driven from second-story units of a commercial-residential structure in the Hyde Park area when plastic sheeting covering the roof during renovation gave way because of the weight of accumulated rainwater.

In Orange County, the CHP responded to more than 30 accidents, none of which resulted in serious injuries, but snarled freeways.

“We had so many crashes today that all our officers are doing is basically going from one crash to the next,” said CHP Officer Angel Johnson.

The rain was a different and welcome story for the area’s $250-million agriculture industry, dealt an earlier blow by the recent cold snap.

At the Stanton Tree Farm, co-owner Bill Nickel had no customers willing to brave the rains, but he was smiling anyway from the money he figures to save by not having to water his 10-acre site.

“Ain’t this great!” Nickel said as he watched the downpour.

“This should mean just a tremendous benefit to the agriculture and horticulture industry. This has been a long-awaited rain, and it’s certainly welcomed by us,” said Frank Parsons, deputy agriculture commissioner for Orange County.

Parsons said the rains should be enough to make a difference in the growing patterns of strawberries, citrus, avocados and a range of other products.

In Ventura County, farmers were equally pleased, but they were looking for more rain.

“This storm’s definitely not a drought breaker,” said Terry Schaeffer, an agricultural weather forecaster in Santa Paula.

DAY IN THE RAIN: B3