Mud, Rain and Sandbags : Weather: Deputies warn La Conchita residents to leave their homes due to threat of mudslides.

Sheriff’s deputies warned La Conchita residents late Monday that they should leave their homes because rainfall that began at midday could trigger a major mudslide.

As rains continued steadily into the evening, residents of La Conchita’s 198 households were handed their second notice in five days, this one telling of 10-foot slippage on the hill above the tiny coastal enclave near the Santa Barbara County line.

Authorities said the top of the ancient landslide mass, declared a threat by county geologists last fall, had moved 10 feet even before Monday’s rains, due to heavy ground-water saturation. A service road leading to La Conchita Ranch also has fallen 18 feet.

“We are strongly advising that tonight might be the good night to go,” said Sheriff’s Senior Deputy Chuck Buttell.

Meanwhile, road crews spent the day bulldozing tons of dirt from the Ventura River, hoping to protect a badly damaged street and two bridges in the Oak View area from further flooding.

With forecasters calling for more than an inch of rain before the system moves out late today, county road workers were not the only ones scrambling to protect property.

Earlier in the day, a crew of forestry workers and firefighters filled sandbags and built berms to protect La Conchita residents from the hillside that is threatening their homes.

National Weather Service meteorologists in Oxnard said the storm is not expected to cause significant street flooding. Rainfall that began Monday was expected to turn heavy for a brief time early this morning before tapering off later today, meteorologist Clay Morgan said.

Rain will be heaviest in the foothills and mountains, where up to two inches may fall, Morgan said. Coastal areas will receive between 1 and 1 1/2 inches of rain, he said.

A winter storm warning is in effect through noon today for the mountain areas, where six to 10 inches of snow may fall at the highest elevations, Morgan said.

The system over Ventura County is the result of two storms that collided over the region, he said. A plume of moisture from the southwest Pacific mixed with a cooler, low-pressure ridge sliding south from Oregon, he said.

“We’re going to just have a happy, wet marriage of storms around here tomorrow,” Morgan said Monday.

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Clear, cool days will return Wednesday and should remain through the weekend, forecasters said. Highs will hover near the middle 60s in the coastal regions to the upper 60s in the valleys.

County flood-control officials are not issuing warnings because the relatively dry weather in the past three weeks has helped dry out saturated soil, engineer John Weikel said.

Peak rainfall will be significantly lower than the January storms that caused extensive flooding along the Ventura River, he added.

“We don’t anticipate any major problems.”

Despite those assurances, county crews worked Monday to clear debris from the Ventura River at its crossing with the Santa Ana Boulevard Bridge. Workers bulldozed tons of rich brown soil from the center of the riverbed, pushing it back to form berms along the river’s eastern edge.

The work is needed to save what remains of badly damaged Santa Ana Boulevard. That thoroughfare, the major road to Oak View for residents of nearby Live Oak Acres, became impassable after January’s floodwaters ripped out the soil underneath it.

To get to Oak View, Live Oak Acres residents must take an 11-mile detour.

County road workers are channeling the river to keep the flow away from the damaged road and the bridge, which has become unstable because of flood damage, said Butch Britt, a deputy director in the county’s public works agency.

Workers also are shoring up the Casitas View Bridge in Foster Park, Britt said. Floodwaters last month tore out chunks of picnic areas along the river’s eastern edge and threatened to wash out the bridge, he said.

The county got verbal approval from the state Fish and Game Department to bulldoze the riverbed because of the emergency situation, Britt said. Because some species that live in the river are protected, it normally takes a long while to acquire permits to do grading, he said.

Simi Valley road workers have been making an effort to keep storm drains clear this winter because of the heavy rainfall, said John Watring, assistant director of public works.

“We spent a lot of time today inspecting drains and making sure none are clogged,” he said. “We’re ready for more rain.”

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In La Conchita, residents braced for the latest storm with anxiety. Just days before, the county had handed out notices advising residents to be prepared to leave during moderate to heavy rainfall due to a landslide threat.

The notice distributed Monday night to La Conchita recommended voluntary evacuation for people living in houses at the base of the hillside behind Vista del Rincon Drive and on Fillmore and Selzah avenues.

Mary Lou Olson said fire crews sandbagged some of the houses in her neighborhood but stopped at hers, saying it would take too many man-hours.

“This has been a frustrating few days,” she said.

Ventura County Fire Department dispatcher Jackie Noel, however, said Monday night that some houses weren’t sandbagged because they weren’t directly threatened.

Earlier Monday, a hand crew with the California Forest Department filled more than 1,000 sandbags and built diversion dams along Vista del Rincon and Fillmore Street, the area most threatened by mud flows.

“They’re working like beavers,” said Dorothy Bonenberger, 62, whose home sits just below the unstable hillside. “They’re doing a fantastic job.”

Times correspondent Jan Stevens contributed to this report.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

County Rainfall Here are rainfall figures from the Ventura County Flood Control Department for the 24-hour period ending 6 p.m. Monday. Oct. 1 is the beginning of the official rain year.

Rainfall Rainfall Normal rainfall Location last 24 hours since Oct. 1 to date Camarillo .12 16.61 8.35 Casitas Dam .00 35.21 14.62 El Rio .08 20.55 9.34 Fillmore .12 21.98 11.83 Moorpark .08 17.57 9.07 Ojai .00 27.92 13.13 Upper Ojai .00 31.73 14.17 Oxnard .00 19.59 9.00 Piru .04 21.88 10.60 Santa Paula .08 23.39 11.01 Simi Valley .12 18.64 8.74 Thousand Oaks .24 19.57 9.43 Ventura Govt. Center .04 21.62 9.95