Deluge Brings Damage, Relief : Ventura County: Rockslides and accidents accompany the storm. Seasonal rainfall approaches near-normal levels for the first time in five years.

An Alaska storm front pounded Ventura County with more than five inches of rain in some areas Monday, triggering rockslides and mudslides and bringing seasonal rainfall to near normal for the first time in five years.

The heavy rain, which authorities said was a factor in 60 minor traffic accidents in the county Monday, was expected to continue this morning, with the National Weather Service predicting that another two to three inches will fall before the storm abates about midday.

The storm, which was concentrated in Southern California but also doused the San Joaquin Valley north to Sacramento, could leave as much as six feet of new snow in Ventura County mountains in the Los Padres National Forest, weather service meteorologist Terry Schaeffer said.

The weather service predicted a short break in the wet weather this afternoon, with another rainstorm scheduled to move into Southern California on Wednesday and continue through Friday.

But even with rainfall approaching normal levels for the first time since the drought began in 1986, the county is still 29 inches below normal for the five-year period, weather experts cautioned.

“We need 300% of a normal year to make up the deficit,” said Dolores Taylor, a Ventura County hydrologist. “This rain will help the reservoirs quite a bit, but it will not help the ground water. And it does not undo the cumulative damage.”

And water agencies, including the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, said they have no plans to relax restrictions on water supplied to customers. “Our drought is still on,” said Bob Gomperz, district spokesman.

Late Monday, the weather service in Los Angeles issued a flash flood warning for coastal slopes and canyons in both Ventura and Santa Barbara counties as hillsides, valleys and once-dry stream beds reached saturation levels.

In Santa Barbara County, the storm closed San Marcos Pass on California 154, where fire-blighted soil slid onto the road. Rain also filled the Gibraltar Reservoir enough so that Santa Barbara can draw water for the first time since the reservoir went dry in November, 1989.

Any fruit and vegetable farmers in Ventura County whose fields were not prepared with proper drainage pipes or terracing were expected to suffer erosion damage as the storm continued to gain intensity late Monday.

But area growers said they will take the bad with the good.

“Any trouble is minor compared to the benefits that come with the rain,” said Glenn Miller, president of the Saticoy Lemon Assn., one of the largest grower-owned cooperatives in the nation.

Ventura County roads were littered with accidents as rain-slick pavement sent cars sliding out of control. Traffic backed up on California 33 between Casitas Springs and Ojai where three-foot-diameter boulders had to be cleared. Mudslides and more rockslides were reported on that route and along California 150 between Ojai and Santa Paula.

Traffic on the Ventura Freeway slowed and snarled as drivers were delayed by rain and wet roads. California Highway Patrol officers said the Pacific Coast Highway was temporarily blocked with rocks and mud at Point Mugu. And authorities said the highway could be closed by this morning because of mudslides if Calleguas Creek overflows its banks.

One man in Meiners Oaks was nearly crushed Monday when the roots of a large oak tree eroded and the trunk toppled onto his parked camper, pinning him inside.

Unlike the storm front that moved in Sunday and brought with it unusually cool temperatures, the new weather system expected Wednesday should be accompanied by mild temperatures in the 30s and 40s at night and in the 50s and 60s during the day, with blustery winds, forecasters said.

After another short break, still more rain is expected Saturday. But neither of the coming fronts will have the intensity or the moisture of the one expected to end today, Schaeffer said.

“It just really cranked up,” he said. “It’s been sitting out over the ocean and collecting moisture.”

But despite the drenching in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, the rain Monday and today will only slightly improve the snowpack in the all-important western Sierra Nevada in Northern California.

That snowpack determines how much water the state can ship south to the MWD, which serves 450,000 people in the cities of Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark, Oxnard and Camarillo.

Without more water from the state, the MWD will not relax its restrictions, which calls for 50% reductions overall in water deliveries this year, officials said.

Snow measurements taken Monday morning indicated that half an inch of water content had been added to the Sierra Nevada snowpack but that still left it woefully behind normal conditions.

The rain “just nibbled away at the drought a little,” said Bill Helms, a spokesman for the state Department of Water Resources’ Drought Center in Sacramento.

The measurements showed that the water content in the snowpack has now reached a total of 14 inches, but “we should be at about 27 inches” now.

Compared to a month ago, however, when the snowpack had only 3.5 inches of water content, the new measurements show a vast improvement, Helms said. He said storms in the first week of March, when temperatures were warmer, also increased water supplies somewhat in the state’s reservoirs.

In the Sierra, he said, the amount of snow at ski resorts often adds to misconceptions about the height of the snowpack and the amount of water that will be available from it.

“People come in from Tahoe on Monday morning and say there is three feet of snow in the Sierra, but they’re always looking at the ski resorts which are in the snowiest places. We look at the overall snow in the Sierra,” Helms said.

Contributing to this story were Times staff writers Virginia Ellis in Sacramento and Miles Corwin in Santa Barbara and correspondents Christopher Pummer in Ventura and Thia Bell in Ojai.