‘Pineapple Express’ Heading Out of Area

For Thomas Williams, who stood panhandling at the Van Nuys Boulevard exit off the Ventura Freeway, the nearby overpass was a great way to escape heavy rains Wednesday.

“If you’re cleaned up, you go into a restaurant or somewhere and wait for it to stop,” said Williams, 51, a self-described transient.

“If you’re like me, you go under a bridge or something.”

Williams might get a respite from bridge-hunting today, as the so-called “Pineapple Express” storm, which has doused the area for three days, is expected to move off.

But its last gasps created knots of traffic and other hassles across the region Wednesday.

Fed by the rainstorm out of Hawaii, scattered floods spilled over roadways in commercial and residential areas, but environmental risks posed by overflowing storm drains were expected to be minimal, Los Angeles County health officials said.

Mudslides were reported in hilly areas, but caused only minimal damage. At higher altitudes, the storm had coated mountains--and ski resorts--with between 2 and 14 inches of snow by Wednesday afternoon.

Meteorologists predicted that the storm would veer away from the area today, with rain tapering off and clearing skies by this afternoon.

Many people seemed to accept the intermittent rain as part of winter in the Golden State, a small price to pay for almost year-round sunshine.

“I’m retired, so it doesn’t bother me at all,” said Bill White, 67, of Glendale. “I like the rain.”

During a lull in the precipitation, White stopped by The Newsstand Co. on Brand Boulevard, an outdoor stand protected with plastic and canvas coverings, to pick up several newspapers.

Robert James, manager of the newsstand, said there was no doubt the rain hurt business this week.

James said that on a bright, sunny California day, the stand attracts roughly 400 or more customers. A rainy day may mean 75 or so reckless souls pass by for magazines, newspapers, cigarettes or chewing gum, he said.

“To us, a two- or three-day rainstorm is like 10 feet of snow to the people back East,” James said with a smile.

In Universal City, Ron Metico, a filmmaker, said his commute from Silver Lake usually takes only 15 minutes. On Wednesday, with accidents due to rain-clogged freeways, that drive took 45 minutes, he said.

Alfred Danelian, a service attendant at a Mobil gas station near Cahuenga and Barham boulevards, said some of the drivers waiting for the Ventura Freeway to clear stopped at the station and picked up food.

“No one likes sitting on the freeway,” he said. “So a lot of them come in here for coffee and doughnuts.”

For those dependent on public transportation for child care, medical appointments or other personal business, the rain just made things that much more difficult.

Tacharie Moore, 16, and her 1-year-old daughter, Shayla, were at Van Nuys Municipal Court to support a relative dealing with a legal matter. The rain meant getting wet while waiting for buses and scurrying from one building to another, all while trying to make sure Shayla was all right in her baby carriage, Moore said.

“It’s difficult,” she said. “I hate standing at the bus stops that don’t have the coverings. . . . It’s not supposed to rain in Southern California.”

Although the region has been more than an inch short of its typical 10.15 inches of rain at this point in the season, “this storm could catch you up to near normal,” said Curtis Brach, a forecaster with WeatherData.

The storm dropped 1.39 inches on the Civic Center from Tuesday afternoon to Wednesday afternoon, the National Weather Service said. But it swamped other areas, including some parts of Ventura County, with as much as 5 inches.

As Wednesday’s drizzle and run-off continued to eat at the hole, officials examined ways to extract several propane containers, oxygen tanks and the large field office, all owned by a nearby rock company. The office, held up by the still-vertical telephone pole, bore cautionary signs indicating that it also could contain explosive materials.

Late Wednesday afternoon, the National Weather Service issued more rainfall totals in inches for the previous 24 hours: Anaheim, 1.49; Long Beach, 1.92; Los Angeles International Airport, 0.99; Northridge, 0.80; Santa Monica, 1.25, and Torrance 0.63.

Times staff writers Frank B. Williams and Abigail Goldman and correspondents Mary Moore in Los Angeles, John Cox in Long Beach and Jeffrey McDonald in Ventura County contributed to this story.