Seeing the Landslide Damage Up Close : Tour: Politicians and the media visit Anaheim Hills houses whose problems range from hairline fissures to structural separations.

Beverly Pederson was stripping the last fixtures from her Anaheim Hills home Friday when she suddenly found herself surrounded by politicians and members of the media.

Holding a wall lamp as she stood over a six-inch-wide crack across her den floor, Pederson patiently and emotionally described to city officials and congressional aides touring the neighborhood how she and her husband bought the $800,000 home as an investment three months ago only to see it slowly torn apart by a landslide.

“This is catastrophic,” she said.

Outside, the garage was separating from the house. The pool was twisted and cracked. The windows were close to breaking from the pressure on them.

The Avenida de Santiago home is described by city officials as the most severely damaged of those affected. Geologists say the land beneath it has moved one foot to the north and sunk one foot down.

“We’re just trying to take everything out of here that we can,” Pederson said. “The home is not insurable. We might lose $500,000. We know we’ll never be able to build on this land again.”

Although the movement in the 25-acre slide area has slowed in recent days, it is still uncertain whether the 45 homes now evacuated will ever be habitable again, officials said.

“Until we get more data . . . there is no way to make a prediction,” said Mark McLarty, a geologist whose firm the city hired to examine and stop the slide. The slide actually dates back at least 15,000 years, and it is probably much older. “But the information we do have suggests that the slide has slowed quite a bit.”

Three houses, including Pederson’s, have been declared unsafe to enter. Estimates of total damage exceed $5 million, and the federal government has declared the neighborhood a disaster area.

Sixty-one wells drilled into the hillside pump 204,000 gallons of water daily from the ground. (Last week, 300,000 gallons a day were being pumped.)

Down the street from the Pederson home, the tour group walked through another evacuated home, where the damage was described as “typical” for the area.

Outside, one-inch gaps separated the house from the surrounding walkway and patio. Inside, one-inch fissures ran through the walls and floor of the anteroom. Floor tiles showed hairline fractures and bowed with the pressure of the ground movement beneath.

As he walked away from the home, Fire Chief Jeff Bowman remarked that a house next door has little or no damage.

“It’s funny how these homes have been selectively damaged,” Bowman said.

Marcia Gilchrist, an aide to U.S. Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton), said she was most touched by the uncertainty the homeowners must feel.

“They don’t know what is going to happen to them,” she said.

Anaheim Mayor Tom Daly said one thing is certain: Homeowners will be filing lawsuits that will be in the courts for years as juries try to determine who, if anyone, is responsible.

“This is an attorney’s dream,” Daly said.