Storm Ebbs but Another on Way

In the wake of a torrential winter storm that moved through Southern California on Friday, Orange County residents waded through its aftermath, picking through debris, mopping up garages and enduring snarled traffic as the rain tapered off.

The three-day storm claimed at least one Orange County victim while another clung to life.

In Garden Grove, Edward E. Quintrell, 53, died an hour after the car he was driving hit a tree at the intersection of Nutwood and Lampson avenues. The accident occurred at 9:46 p.m. Thursday.

Police investigators said Quintrell lost control when he failed to see dips in the intersection that were covered by water.

Anaheim firefighters pulled a woman from the swollen waters of the Santa Ana River late Friday. The woman and two companions were rafting on the waterway when the craft was drawn under at one of the river’s spillways. Although the two men suffered only minor injuries, the woman was given CPR and rushed by helicopter to a nearby hospital.

Elsewhere, judges, lawyers and litigants in a Laguna Hills courthouse fled that building when the roof began to leak. On the highways, a 20-car pileup in Mission Viejo left six people injured and closed Interstate 5 for 40 minutes. And beaches suffered, too: Seal Beach and a stretch of shoreline in San Clemente were put off limits as debris and sewage fouled the surf.

The storms caused flooding, power failures and beach closures from Los Angeles to San Diego, and sent part of a Malibu home crashing into the surf. Culver City recorded an inch of rain, Montebello reported 1.55 inches, Long Beach 1.28 and Palm Springs 1.93. Rainfall generally varied from 1 to 3 inches in other parts of the region.

In the western Antelope Valley, homes were flooded when a water detention basin collapsed and sent a muddy river flowing through the community of Quartz Hill. Moving mud banks shoved parked cars out into the middle of the street.

Locally, government workers hustled to clean up. County public works officials were peppered with thousands of calls about impassable streets, clogged drains, flooded garages and the like.

“We’re having a hectic day because there was more rain coming down than anyone ever envisioned,” said William Reiter, county public works operations manager. “There are crews out all over the county dealing with plugged drains and mudslides.”

The weather was expected to improve for the weekend, with clear skies and temperatures rising to about 70 degrees, said Stephen Burback, a meteorologist with WeatherData, which provides forecasts to The Times.

But relief may be short-lived. Another front is forming in the Pacific Ocean and could bring a new round of powerful winter storms by midweek, Burback said.

Accumulated rainwater seeped through the roof of the South County Municipal Court annex in Laguna Hills, soaking ceiling tiles and causing them to collapse under the weight of the water. Walls were drenched, as was valuable computer equipment.

Leakage has long been a problem for the South County facility, one of the county’s most overburdened court complexes.

Margaret Hamlin, South County Court executive officer, said officials had complained about the leaky roof and it was fixed, but “the windows continue to leak, and it’s kind of serious.”

Friday, it became all the more so, as the building was soaked by two consecutive days of heavy rain.

“It was a total disaster,” said Colleen Galaviz, manager of the civil and small claims division. “We had electrical equipment wallowing in water. A computer was sitting in an inch of water.”

Presiding Municipal Judge Pamela L. Iles, who ordered the facility evacuated, said staff members feared that they could be electrocuted if they stayed inside.

“We’ll be in real trouble if we cannot open on Monday,” Iles said. “We’ll have a huge backlog and if we can’t use the computers, we’ll have to resort to going back to the old way. . . . I don’t want to think of it.”

County officials did not have a precise estimate on the damage but said it probably was not severe.

In Irvine, damage also was widespread. Still, residents taking stock of scattered roof tiles and felled trees counted their blessings that a fluke tornado did not cause more harm.

“I’m a lot luckier than people in the Persian Gulf,” said Melanie Lawson, 34, whose house on the corner of Orchard and Bright Hollow was one of the first hit by Thursday’s freak twister. “You have to take these things in stride and go on--it wasn’t a big deal.”

“There’s a lifetime’s work here for a carpenter,” said 26-year-old carpenter John Riebe as he covered a damaged roof with plastic sheeting.

Even as the cleanup was under way in Irvine, county highways and streets were rife with rain-related traffic jams.

The worst of them occurred at 10 a.m., when one driver headed south on Interstate 5 near Crown Valley Parkway lost control of his vehicle and touched off a chain reaction. Twenty cars piled up and 14 had to be towed from the scene.

“It had been drizzling for a while, and all of a sudden there was a big downpour,” said CHP Officer Ken Daily. “Apparently, one of the cars did some hydroplaning, and the driver lost control.”

Conditions on some other county roads deteriorated so badly in the downpour that officials closed two of them to traffic and frantically cleared debris from the third.

Ortega Highway was closed from La Pata Avenue, about 1 1/2 miles from the Santa Ana Freeway, to the Riverside County border, due to a massive rock and mud slide. The rural, two-lane highway was not expected to reopen until sometime today, Daily said.

Eastbound Carbon Canyon Road near Valencia Avenue in Brea also remained closed Friday, police officials said. And rain loosened a portion of a hillside along the eastbound Riverside Freeway near Gypsum Canyon Road, CHP Officer Angel Johnson said.

Mud flowed onto the slow lane of the freeway, forcing eastbound traffic into the left lanes, she said.

The storm’s effects were no less pronounced at sea, and the combination of floating debris, spilled sewage and frothing surf forced some stretches of Orange County beaches to close.

River runoff--the highest since 1983--from the San Gabriel, Santa Ana and San Juan Creek waterways brought tons of dirt and debris to the Pacific Ocean, turning the surf a chocolate-milk color, lifeguards said.

In Seal Beach and San Clemente, the surf was fouled by an eclectic mix of discarded items, such as old tires, wall board, clothes and road signs.

“There’s so much debris out in the waters,” Seal Beach lifeguard Lt. Dan Dorsey said. “If you’re out there swimming or surfing, you can bump into a bathtub, or a sheet of plywood.”

Dorsey said waves crested up to eight feet. Police arrested and cited three men in separate incidents for ignoring lifeguards.

Although high enough to pique the interest of local surfers, the waves were rendered un-rideable by the high winds.

“It’s like Victory at Sea here,” said Huntington Beach lifeguard Lt. Steve Davidson. “It looks like the agitations cycle in a washing machine.”

Spilled sewage complicated the situation at county beaches. In San Clemente, one spill, thought to have been caused by the foul weather, dumped 1,000 gallons of raw waste into the ocean.

The sewage was spotted at about noon when it rose out of a manhole cover at the base of the pier and began running down the pavement.

The Orange County Water Department was notified and a 500-foot strip of beach on either side of the pier was ordered closed until at least Monday, said Brian Covert, a lifeguard supervisor.

Huntington Beach, Newport Beach and Laguna Beach strands remained open, but surfers and swimmers were warned by lifeguards.

The pounding surf also hampered efforts to dispose of a headless whale that washed ashore in Dana Point on Wednesday.

“He’s just floating in the surf,” said Ed Williams, Dana Point Harbor’s supervising park ranger. “As soon as he comes ashore, we’ll get a tractor out there and bury him.”

The county’s two major amusement parks were also affected.

Visitors to Buena Park’s Knott’s Berry Farm on Thursday were handed rain checks and ushered out by early afternoon. The amusement park remained closed Friday.

“The rain has been good for Southern California, but not so good for Knott’s,” said spokesman Stuart Zanville, adding that it was the first time in at least five years that the park was closed for two days in a row.

Disneyland, where many of the attractions are housed indoors, toughed out the downpour.

“We still have a lot of guests--they’re just more heavily dressed than usual,” said spokesman John McClintock. Still, two attractions--Tom Sawyer’s Island and the Skyway between Tomorrowland and Fantasyland--were shut down.

Outside the Magic Kingdom, the weather--most notably the after-effects of the extraordinary tornado--transformed normally quiet communities into overnight tourist attractions.

Mariana Giordano, 37, an Irvine resident whose home weathered $6,000 in damages in the tornado, eyed the gawkers cruising up and down her block and marvelled at the events of the past few days.

“This is like Disneyland, cars up and down the street all day,” she said. “Everyone wants to see a tornado.”

A STORM OF ACTIVITY

This week’s storm brought the Santa Ana River to its highest level since 1983. At one point, the rate of flow reached approximately 6,000 cubic feet per second (44,880 gallons). By Friday afternoon, it had dropped to about 3,000 cubic feet per second (22,440 gallons). More than half of the runoff came from Prado Dam, where the Army Corps of Engineers began releasing 2,500 cubic feet per second at 6 p.m. Thursday. By Friday evening, 5,000 acre feet had been discharged from the dam. Officials estimate that a total of 20,000 acre feet (more than 6 billion gallons) will be released by Monday. There is room to store the water, but the reservoir is home to the least Bell’s vireo, an endangered species of bird, and federal wildlife-protection laws prohibit raising the water level beyond a certain level.

Even though most of the runoff is being discharged into the ocean, the Orange County Water District estimates that local ground-water levels are recharging at about 150 acre feet a day.

* The roof of the South County Municipal Courthouse in Laguna Niguel leaked so badly that officials closed the building and canceled all hearings for the day. The walls were soaked and computers drenched.

* A 20-car pileup on Interstate 5 at Crown Valley Parkway in Mission Viejo closed the freeway Friday morning for 40 minutes. Six people were injured, according to the California Highway Patrol.

* Edward E. Quintrell, 53, died when his car struck a tree head-on at Nutwood Street and Lampson Avenue in Garden Grove. Police said Quintrell lost control when he failed to see dips in the roadway.

* A brief power outage in Santa Ana disrupted service to 22,000 customers, including the Santa Ana Superior Court.

* Workers at Sand Cal in Anaheim, the largest supplier of sandbags in Southern California, worked ‘round the clock to fill more than 100,000 orders. Most of the sandbags delivered to Orange County locations were used at construction sites to prevent erosion of bare ground.

* Because of mudslides and rockslides, Ortega Highway was closed from La Pata Avenue, about 1 1/2 miles from the Santa Ana Freeway to the Riverside County border.

* Mudslides also closed the eastbound Carbon Canyon Road near Valencia Avenue in Brea throughout Friday and slowed traffic on the eastbound Riverside Freeway near Gypsum Canyon Road.

* Offshore winds measuring up to 25 m.p.h. followed the storm as it moved out of the area, prompting small-craft warnings and red-flag alerts on county beaches.

* Waves at Seal Beach reached 8 feet, prompting lifeguards to close the beach Friday. Police arrested three men in separate incidents who ignored the closure.

* Knott’s Berry Farm issued rain checks to visitors before closing Thursday afternoon. The amusement park remained closed Friday.

Staff writers Elizabeth Howton, Janice L. Jones, Davan Maharaj, Frank Messina, Janice L. Jones and Len Hall.

Storm’s Rainfall Figures Total number of inches that have fallen since the storm began on Wednesday. Fullerton: 3.90 inches Brea: 4.88 inches Yorba Linda: 4.65 inches Cypress: 3.98 inches Villa Park: 4.76 inches Santiago Peak: 12.7 inches Santa Ana: 4.02 inches El Toro: 5.63 inches Mission Viejo: 3.58 inches San Juan Capistrano: 4.61 inches Laguna Beach: 3.90 inches Costa Mesa: 3.88 inches Anaheim: 4.13 inches Huntington Beach: 3.27 inches