Storm Leaves Destructive Footprint : Weather: System that dropped more than 3 inches of rain on San Diego and knocked out power to almost 175,000 is expected to dissipate today.

A wind-whipped, three-day winter storm that dumped about 3 1/3 inches of rain on the San Diego area was expected to dissipate by early today, leaving in its wake a legacy of flooded streets and litter-strewn roads, felled trees, mudslides, battered avocado groves and tens of thousands of households and businesses without electricity or phone service.

In one incident that led to a death Friday afternoon, a man was killed when a large sign, apparently blown over by the wind, crushed him on an Oceanside street, authorities said. Michael Reim, a 28-year-old transient, was standing on Mission Avenue near Rancho del Oro at about 2 p.m. when the sign fell, said police spokesman Rudy Martinez.

As the storm’s intensity waned late Friday, almost 175,000 households and businesses were without electricity in San Diego and southern Orange counties, thanks to downed or damaged overhead power lines and flooded underground cables. That meant more than 15% of San Diego Gas & Electric Co.’s 1.1 million area customers were without service--the largest volume of outages in perhaps a decade or more, officials said.

“We’ve been hit hard just about everywhere,” said David Smith, a spokesman for SDG&E;, who noted that blackouts stretched from the U.S.-Mexico border area to beyond Camp Pendleton. “People around here have been scratching their heads and wondering when it’s been worse than this.”

Meanwhile, about 3,600 homes and businesses lost phone service, and others went into the weekend lacking cable TV.

“We got hit pretty hard last night,” Tom McNaghten, a spokesman for Pacific Bell, said Friday. He said most of the damaged lines should be back on line by Sunday.

Although the unusually harsh weather pattern brought much-needed water to reservoirs, fields and lawns throughout California, the amounts were not expected to diminish significantly the effects of the drought, now in its fifth year.

In Tijuana and elsewhere in Baja California, the storm’s effects were even more severe, as many neighborhoods and roads there have limited drainage.

Throughout the San Diego area, streets and freeways were littered with palm, eucalyptus and other branches, along with slick mud and rocks that cascaded down from eroded hillsides. Felled trees and suddenly raging arroyos forced shutdowns of roads big and small, including portions of California 78 in Oceanside and several lanes of California 67 near Ramona. At least one small bridge over the Sweetwater River in Dehesa was also washed out.

“We’ve got rockslides and mudslides, tree limbs and other debris on the roadways,” said Tom Nipper of the California Department of Transportation.

Despite the hazardous driving conditions and scores of fender-benders, authorities reported no fatal traffic accidents Friday.

High tides and swells of up to 10 feet battered the coastline, but lifeguards said damage was limited. Many residents of coastal and flood-prone areas were ready with sandbags, fearing that matters could deteriorate.

The extensive flooding was perhaps most dramatic in the Mission Valley area, the commercial and tourist center where many motorists found themselves stranded Friday by the rising waters of the San Diego River. Area parking lots were inundated, as were several businesses, including a movie theater.

Early Friday, firefighters rescued eight homeless people trapped beneath a bridge in the riverbed. Later, city lifeguards spent hours assisting stranded motorists in getting out og the suddenly fierce waters.

“People think they can drive through, but they get stuck in the water and mud, and their car stalls,” said Gunnar Grandquist, a city lifeguard.

Particularly hard hit by power outages were El Cajon and other areas of eastern San Diego County, along with Escondido and beach communities, SDG&E; said. Work crews hope the expected break in the weather will enable them to restore service to many homes this weekend.

Why did the storm have such a devastating effect on the power grid? Apart from its intensity--winds reached 35 m.p.h. in some areas--a utility official cited the paucity of inclement weather in recent months.

“We’re paying the price for all that good weather,” said Smith, the SDG&E; spokesman, noting that the region’s mild winter to date meant the power infrastructure had not been threatened recently and was therefore vulnerable. “Usually by now, our system has been tested two or three times.”

The outages forced the U.S. Postal Service to delay delivery of second- and third-class mail. Lack of electricity meant that employees who arrived at some post offices early Friday had no light by which to sort the mail, said Mike Cannone, a service spokesman in San Diego.

The John Adams Post Office in Normal Heights was flooded, he said. No mail was damaged, but delivery was delayed.

Flooding also caused the shutdown of the Valencia Park Public Library in Southeast San Diego. The facility will be closed today as well, said Anna Martinez, assistant city librarian. No books were damaged, she said.

Friday, the third day of the storm, saw less traffic on area roadways, the California Highway Patrol said, and those who did take to the road tended to be more cautious.

“The first day of the rainstorm is always the worst,” said CHP Officer Joe Wolf, who noted that drivers tended to be less conscious of the hazard on the first day, and that the accumulated oil on the roadbeds makes driving particularly dangerous after the initial rainfall. “People tend to get used to it (the rain) or slow down,” Wolf said.

Growers edgy about withered fields and mandated water-use reductions welcomed the deluge--”Ecstatic is the word,” said David Owen of the San Diego County Farm Bureau, trade group for the area’s $800-million agricultural industry--but many avocado growers saw their fruit fall from trees prematurely. In some cases, heavy winds knocked down the shallow-rooted trees.

Workers were combing the groves Friday seeking to collect salvageable avocados from the ground, and there was concern that a sudden oversupply of storm-harvested fruit could depress prices for the fruit.

The storm, which began early Wednesday, dropped 3.31 inches of rain on Lindbergh Field as of 4 p.m. Friday, according to the National Weather Service--almost an inch more than the area had received in the eight months since July 1.

Mountain areas were inundated: Cuyamaca Rancho State Park in the eastern part of the county received almost 9 1/4 inches during the 24-hour period that ended at 4 p.m Friday. More than 7 inches fell on Julian during that time, and almost 6 inches was recorded on Palomar Mountain. Almost 5 inches fell on Campo during the period.

Despite the downpour, however, San Diego remains about an inch below the seasonal norm. The season runs from July 1 to June 30.