Flood Alerts Issued as Storms Drench Region

Flood alerts were issued for Southern California through tonight as two vast weather systems moved onshore with steady rain on Friday afternoon, setting off mudslides in Orange County, causing a massive sewage spill and flooding a creek that swept a man to his death.

The National Weather Service said the situation was dangerous and the flood potential was “the highest it has been in years.”

As the main force of the storm systems approached Friday evening, the Orange County Board of Supervisors declared a state of emergency and ordered work crews of the Environmental Management Agency to began repair efforts in flooding areas.

The rains also sent mud into a house in Trabuco Canyon and spun a car out of control and into a creek in the same area. The storm sent a car hydroplaning into another vehicle on the San Diego Freeway in Costa Mesa and caused more than 75 other accidents--mostly fender-benders--on Orange County freeways as of 9 p.m., the California Highway Patrol reported.

The ground in most areas is saturated, and forecasters expect up to five inches of rain by Sunday night in the coastal valleys, with up to twice that much in the foothills.

A lifeguard pulled a 44-year-old man from Coyote Creek on the Orange County/Long Beach border Friday afternoon, but efforts to revive him failed.

Officials said the swift current had swept Lakewood resident Jessie Hernandez downstream for about 2 1/2 miles Friday afternoon before lifeguard Paul Wawrzynski grabbed him near Willow Street.

“I ran down the embankment and jumped in. He was face down and unconscious,” Wawrzynski said.

Wawrzynski, holding onto Hernandez and a boogie board, managed to swim to the side of the channel, where paramedics awaited. Hernandez died about an hour later at a hospital.

At about 9 p.m., a truck traveling down Trabuco Canyon Road crashed and flipped over into Trabuco Creek near O’Neill Regional Park. The driver managed to escape just before the truck went into the water. He clung to the edge of the creek until firefighters rescued him. He has not been identified.

Also in Trabuco Canyon, residents of a house on Hamilton Truck Trail managed to escape injury when a mudslide hit their home, damage about 25% of the home.

Cars drew to a near standstill on Orange County freeways and roads because of accidents and lane closures.

One woman was injured on the southbound San Diego Freeway near Harbor Boulevard when a hydroplaning car struck hers about 3 p.m. Officials said the other driver had been speeding when he hit a pool of water and lost control.

The woman was in stable condition at Fountain Valley Regional Hospital and Medical Center on Friday evening.

Shortly after 5 p.m., officials closed Laguna Canyon Road from Coast Highway to the San Diego Freeway because of mudslides, flooding and a utility pole that fell across the road. The downed pole also left about 3,000 customers without power for more than two hours Friday evening.

Silverado Canyon Road was closed at Oak Lane after a mudslide caused a large boulder to knock down an oak tree, which in turn knocked power lines onto the road.

Live Oak Canyon was closed from Cook’s Corner to Hamilton Truck Trail about 4:30 p.m. when rains triggered a mudslide 40 feet long and two feet deep. The mud was removed by late Friday night, but more rain could cause a repeat of the slide, authorities warned.

Other road closures included both sides of Pacific Coast Highway from Warner Avenue to Golden West Street in Huntington Beach, both directions of Ortega Highway near San Juan Capistrano, all lanes of the eastbound Garden Grove Freeway west of Magnolia Street, and the southbound on-ramps to the San Diego Freeway at Euclid Street and Harbor Boulevard.

Orange County Supervisor Thomas F. Riley said the state of emergency order “gives us authority to ensure that public and private properties will be safe by dispatching crews to those problem areas. The crews will make sure that the roads are clear and dangerous objects are removed.”

Supervisor Vaddi H. Vasquez said the state of emergency order permits the board to order work crews to clear debris and other dangerous objects from private properties. It also qualifies the county to receive financial aid from state or federal government.

Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley also declared a state of emergency, saying the area is threatened with “extraordinary loss of life and property.”

Officials in Santa Barbara County did the same, because of the flood threat along the Santa Ynez River below Cachuma Reservoir.

The reservoir--down two years ago to 15% of capacity, prompting severe water-rationing in the city of Santa Barbara--was full to the brim Friday evening. Officials said water should start pouring over the reservoir dam’s spillways for the first time in a decade, threatening the property of downstream farmers.

Topanga Creek overflowed its banks above Malibu Friday afternoon, but no homes were reported in immediate danger. Rocks, mudslides and small waterfalls cascaded down onto roads in Topanga Canyon, and several massive oak trees toppled slowly in the rain-softened earth.

A few minutes after the Lakewood man was pulled from Coyote Creek, the Los Angeles Police Department’s Air Support Division had to rescue one of its own from the roiling waters of the Los Angeles River.

An officer, who asked that his name not be used, said police Lt. Keith Johnson was practicing swift-water rescue techniques on a jet ski when the craft’s engine failed near the Pasadena Freeway overpass.

“He started washing down the river,” the officer said. “We had to use one of our helicopters to pull him out near 4th Street. I don’t know what happened to the jet ski.”

The officer said Johnson apparently was unhurt in the mishap.

The Los Angeles County Health Department closed most Santa Monica Bay beaches Friday afternoon when a storm-caused sewage spill dumped millions of gallons of partially treated sewage into Ballona Creek.

The beaches, from Topanga Canyon Boulevard south to Malaga Cove near the Palos Verdes Peninsula, had just reopened Monday after a similar sewage spill last week. Both spills occurred because the Hyperion Treatment Plant is undergoing major construction and cannot accommodate drainage from the area’s storm-swollen sewers, said Bob Hayes, a spokesman for the city Board of Public Works.

Beginning at 1:30 p.m. Friday, partially treated sewage was discharged from the sewer system at a rate of a million gallons an hour into the creek, which empties into Santa Monica Bay.

“This was not unexpected,” said Jack Petralia, director of environmental protection for the county Department of Health Services, which ordered the closures. “This happens when it rains a lot.”

But Heal the Bay, an environmental group that monitors the Santa Monica Bay, issued a statement saying that the sewage spill “presents a significant threat to the marine environment and to swimmers.”

“The bay will remain closed to swimmers for the next two to three days,” the group said. “The long-term impact is more difficult to assess.”

In Woodland Hills, a wall of a vacant, condemned single-story house in the 4500 block of San Blas Ave. split off and slid down a hill into an empty field below Friday morning. No one was injured.

In Orange County, the rain caused widespread phone-service problems.

“This is the worst rain damage that we can remember in recent years,” said Pacific Bell spokeswoman Linda Bonniksen. “It’s not that it’s a hard rain, but it just won’t stop. We can’t dry out. We’re really slogging along in this rain, but we’re not getting a break from Mother Nature.”

Bonniksen said the company usually receives about 400 requests a day for service in the county, but on Friday received about 4,500 requests. The continuing rain has seeped well into the ground, she said, interfering with even the most heavily protected cables.

The transition road from the northbound Santa Ana Freeway to the northbound San Gabriel River Freeway was closed because of potholes. Also closed were the La Brea Avenue on-ramp to the eastbound Santa Monica Freeway and a portion of the southbound Golden State Freeway transition to the eastbound Simi Valley Freeway.

In San Diego County, flooding and mudslides cut several roads and washed out part of a freight rail line between Oceanside and Escondido.

Officials were keeping a close watch on the San Luis Rey River in north San Diego County, where floods wiped out an Oceanside mobile home park late Thursday, leaving seven families homeless.

Rescue workers attached to each other with ropes pulled two people from the flooded Tijuana River just north of the Mexican border. At least 100 people have been pulled from the river in the last week, and several more are believed to have been swept out to sea to their deaths.

Across the border, residents braced for more possible flooding after last week’s deluge that left 17 dead and 4,200 people homeless. Guillermo Parra, a spokesman for Tijuana Mayor Hector Osuna, said the city is expecting “intense rains” this weekend and the city had been put on a state of alert for flooding.

Mike Smith, a meteorologist with WeatherData Inc, said the current flood threat was being produced by the interaction of complex weather systems.

By far the largest of these was a vast swath of subtropical moisture that extended almost 3,000 miles Friday night from south of the Hawaiian Islands to Southern California and Baja California. Slightly north of this swath, a large low-pressure system was spinning slowly off the central California coast.

Within the low-pressure system were three “impulses” of concentrated low pressure, circling slowly around the center of the system in a counterclockwise direction, officials said.

Smith said that, acting on its own, the swath of subtropical moisture was producing the sort of steady light rain that fell steadily on Southern California Friday afternoon. He said that as the impulses move onshore they will collide with the swath, tapping its extensive moisture to produce “very heavy rain.”

Times staff writers Alicia DiRado, Tracey Kaplan, Roxana Kopetman, Maria LaGanga and Julie Tamaki in Los Angeles, Stacy Wong and Greg Hernandez in Orange County and Chris Kraul in San Diego County contributed to this story.

The Rain Machine

Several weather systems are dominating the Southland’s weather picture. On Friday night, a layer of deep tropical moisture extended from Hawaii to the mainland. Slightly north, a large, low-pressure system was spinning off the Central California coast. Within the low-pressure system were three “impulses” of concentrated low pressure, producing very heavy rain as they collided with the tropical system. 1. Impulse--Due before dawn today, striking mainly at Northern California. 2. Impulse--Expected to hit Southern California tonight. 3. Impulse--Arriving late Sunday. Source: WeatherData Inc.

It’s Raining, It’s Pouring

Recent rainfall amounts have pushed Orange County’s rainy season total well past last year’s level. Amount of rainfall from 4 p.m. Thursday to 4 p.m. Friday: Newport Beach: 0.96 Anaheim: 0.87 Santa Ana: 1.29 El Toro: 1.13 San Juan Capistrano: 1.15

Santa Ana rainfall, in inches: This year: 10.56 Last year: 2.63 Average: 4.20 Source: WeatherData Inc.