Drenched Again : Weather: Two die as storm causes dozens of traffic accidents and dumps up to six inches of rain in the county.

Two people were killed and at least three others were injured as dozens of traffic accidents kept emergency crews scrambling under heavy rains Thursday, a California Highway Patrol official said.

“We have so many accidents right now that we’re having a hard time keeping track of them,” a CHP dispatcher said Thursday evening.

Rain-slicked highways and poor visibility contributed to a fatal collision on California 126 west of Fillmore about 6:15 p.m. Thursday that claimed two lives, the CHP said. At least three others were injured in separate accidents along the Ventura Freeway and California 118 and 23 Thursday evening, officials said.

No details on the victims were available late Thursday, CHP officials said.

“The best advisory I have for people now is to slow down and allow for extra time in their driving,” CHP spokeswoman Staci Morse said. “Even if the rain does let up, the water will pool on the roadway, so they need to slow down and buckle up.”

The storm arrived Thursday morning after weeks of balmy sunshine, delivering one to six inches of rain throughout the county, pushing totals for the month close to normal and doubling the average yearly precipitation.

The west county received the bulk of what the low-pressure system dropped, with the Ventura River watershed areas reporting up to six inches of rain. But forecasters said the east county would get its share today.

“The edge of the storm is not moving that fast inland,” said Steve Burback of WeatherData Inc., which provides forecasts for The Times. “The rain band will move to the east first and behind that the showers will develop. They’ll get every bit of an inch or two themselves.”

The drenching was welcome news to west county growers, who can put off irrigating their fruit trees.

“It’s like $20 bills coming out of the sky,” said Link Leavens, a partner in the Leavens Ranches, which farms 800 acres of citrus and avocado groves in Ventura and Santa Paula.

“If you were to ask for a better winter rain season, you couldn’t have ordered one.”

Burback predicted partly cloudy skies with a slight chance of showers through Sunday morning. Temperatures today will hover in the 50s and 60s, with light to moderate winds, he said.

Another significant storm might hit the area by midweek, he said.

On Thursday, flood-control officials reported minor street flooding but said flood channels were “doing just fine.”

“Because of this recent stop in the rainstorms, the last three weeks or so, we have more capacity in our watersheds,” said Hassan Kasraie, manager of the district’s hydrology section. “It’s been a nice gentle rain so far.”

Some drivers along Channel Drive in Ventura might disagree. Motorists there plowed through up to two feet of water that pooled between the sidewalks on Thursday.

“That’s why they call it Channel Drive,” resident John Wells said. “It’s like a big channel. To be honest, it doesn’t bother me that much. But I don’t know why they keep it this way.”

Terry Schaeffer, a National Weather Service agriculture meteorologist based in Santa Paula, said Thursday’s rain raises the yearly total there--more than 33 inches to date--to nearly twice the normal level.

“The strawberry growers and some of the row crop farmers would probably prefer it come on a different day, but we’ll take it,” he said.

Earlier winter storms have kept water levels at Lake Casitas high for most of the season, said John Johnson, general manager of the Casitas Municipal Water District near Ojai, where more than 2 1/2 inches of rain fell Thursday.

“This latest storm basically keeps everything wet,” he said. “We’ve totally filled our reservoir, so we’re very happy with that, but at this point any additional rain just helps our customers from not having to buy our water.”

Sharon Scribner of Moorpark said the wet weather has wreaked havoc on her efforts to build a house. But she put the construction break to good use by shopping for a sink at Mountain Gate Plaza in Simi Valley, where nearly one-half inch of rain fell Thursday.

“I’m ready for it to end,” Scribner said. “Enough is enough.”

Gail Bartlow of Simi Valley echoed that thought as she ran errands under drizzling skies.

“When you’re running around getting dripped on, it gets to be a little old,” she said.

Meanwhile, as heavy rain in the Ventura River watershed continued Thursday afternoon, county flood control officials issued a warning to the Ventura Beach RV Resort, which flooded during heavy rains in February last year.

“They put us on official alert, but right now the river doesn’t appear to be a danger,” General Manager Joe Crognale said. Resort personnel contacted about 40 tenants who were in the park at the time to inform them of the possible threat, but no one was evacuated, he said.

Although farmers welcomed the rain, fire officials were worried about what it means for the impending fire season. Wet weather promotes grass and brush growth, which dries out in the heat of summer, Ventura County Asst. Fire Chief Richard Perry said.

“It has the potential of being a very bad fire season,” he said. “We’re getting a tremendous growth of grass and so forth, and that’s what carries fires during fire season.”

Times correspondents Patrick McCartney and Brenda Day contributed to this report.

County Rainfall

Here are rainfall figures from 8 a.m. Wednesday to 9 p.m. Thursday from the Ventura County Flood Control District. Oct. 1 is the beginning of the official rain year.

Rainfall Rainfall Normal rainfall Location since Wednesday since Oct. 1 to date Camarillo 1.53 21.36 11.58 Casitas Dam 3.76 37.71 20.00 El Rio 2.49 24.66 13.01 Fillmore 2.52 33.81 16.29 Moorpark 1.65 24.73 12.51 Ojai 5.40 41.52 18.19 Upper Ojai 2.85 43.67 19.81 Oxnard 2.09 23.53 12.45 Piru 1.89 N.A. 14.63 Santa Paula 1.99 29.64 15.27 Simi Valley 1.49 N.A. 12.22 Thousand Oaks 1.81 27.92 13.06 Ventura Govt. Center 3.55 26.94 13.87