Storm Threatens 3 Newport Homes on Canyon’s Edge : Weather: Conditions triple traffic accidents. Rains, expected to continue today, hamper plans to shore up slide area; other residences may be in danger.

The storm that left three Newport Beach homes facing the sheer edge of a landslide Tuesday and tripled traffic accidents across the county threatens to bring more rain today and Thursday.

WeatherData, which provides forecasts for The Times, predicts a 30% to 40% chance of showers for the next few days.

“This storm is built very strongly,” said Curtis Brack of WeatherData. “But it’s turned out to not be as bad as the past storms because it doesn’t have enough moisture to do real damage.”

But in Newport Beach, the half an inch of rain that fell Tuesday morning slowed week-old efforts to restore a slide area that threatens to send three homes toppling to the bottom of a canyon.

The landslide began Thursday morning when part of the hill along Sandcastle Drive began falling slowly toward the bottom of Buck Gully, said Bob Riblett, 44, a commercial real estate broker whose house is one of three threatened.

City officials warned residents to evacuate, though Building Department Director Ray Schuller said Tuesday that he believes the homes are stable. Despite the city warning, residents have chosen to stay.

Pointing at an air horn on a wall along side his house, Riblett said, “If you hear that horn go off three times, get out of the house.”

Neighbor Shannon Russell, 34, said she and her husband have a newborn and “nowhere to go. We’re a little frightened.”

Workers on Tuesday had begun hauling in more than 300 truckloads of dry soil to stabilize the neighborhood, which is built almost exclusively on landfill. But the rains hampered that work and could endanger more homes, city officials said.

“I’m sure there are some other fill areas that could go,” Schuller said.

While the rain wasn’t as heavy as predicted, it was bad enough to snarl traffic for hours on the county’s major freeways and to trigger more than 50 accidents, including one in which a man was critically injured.

The man, identified only as Eric White, was a passenger in a car traveling south on Interstate 5 near La Paz Road when it slid into another car and then sideswiped a truck, said California Highway Patrol Officer Liza Waggoner.

White was in critical condition Tuesday night at a Mission Viejo hospital.

The accident, which occurred around 10:30 a.m., closed three lanes of traffic for more than an hour, Waggoner said. No one else was seriously injured in the crash.

Most of the other accidents were fender-benders, authorities said.

“We got hit pretty hard during the morning commute,” CHP Officer Tim O’Toole said. “The rains reduced visibility and a lot people just didn’t anticipate having to stop so suddenly. . . . There were a lot of crashes.”

Rains and gusty winds also knocked over several trees in South County, including one that blocked both traffic lanes on Live Oak Canyon Road. Caltrans officials cleared the roadway in about an hour, CHP officials said.

“It’s not a major commuting roadway,” Waggoner said. “But when both lanes are shut down, traffic backs up.”

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Double Trouble

Tuesday’s storm dropped nearly an inch of rain in some parts of the county and increased this season’s total to more than double the norm. Storm totals in inches:

City Inches Anaheim .46 Dana Point .45 El Toro .84 Laguna Beach .75 Newport Beach .45 San Juan Capistrano .59 Santa Ana .55

Santa Ana Totals Season to date: 22.87* Last season to date: 10.85 Normal season to date: 10.60 * Season begins July 1 Source: WeatherData; Researched by JANICE L. JONES / Los Angeles Times