Laguna Mops Up Mud, Prepares for More Rain : Disaster: City officials defend their preparations for possible floods as forecast calls for more storms next week.

LAGUNA BEACH — The day after a rainstorm ushered in mudslides and flooding in areas already scarred by the recent fires, government workers and residents of this besieged city galvanized Friday to clean up water-soaked homes and prepare for more rain next week.

Mudslides from Thursday’s pre-dawn rain, relatively light at 0.6 of an inch, caused an estimated $45,000 in damage to 13 homes, fire officials reported Friday.

However, damage to the Irvine Bowl, home of the annual Pageant of the Masters, was estimated to be at least half a million dollars. The amphitheater building was flooded with a river of mud that ironically forced the cancellation of a weekend benefit for fire victims.

At least three homes were hit with major flooding that reached as high as five feet in ground-level rooms, while about a dozen other houses sustained minor damage by mud and water that drained into their yards or driveways, said Laguna Fire Capt. Bob Scruggs.

Laguna Beach officials, already under siege by some residents over their response to this month’s devastating fire, were quick to defend their preparation for possible floods.

If not for the thousands of sandbags and hay bales that city workers used to shore up streets and hillsides after the fires were under control, the damage could have been worse, officials said.

“Thirteen houses are 13 too many, but the number could have been higher had we not begun immediately to sandbag the area,” said Terry Brandt, director of the municipal services department, which is in charge of emergency preparation.

Still, a few homeowners with flooded property grumbled that the city should have foreseen that once the fire debris and straws from hay bales were washed away, they could also plug up the city’s drainage system, which eventually backed up and contributed to the mudslides.

“They could have cleaned that drain that was bogged up,” said Ray Titus, 22, pointing to a street drain as he drudged through his mud-drenched home on St. Anns Drive Friday. “You pay enough taxes, they should be able to give us our money’s worth.”

But placing blame was far from the minds of many Friday as they braced for the next onslaught.

City officials and residents, unnerved during the morning by weather forecasts predicting more downfalls by afternoon, heaved a collective sigh of relief later in the afternoon when the rains never came.

But forecasters said more rain is expected next Thursday or Friday. An emerging low pressure system from the Gulf of Alaska should bring increasing clouds and fog along the coast, as well as some rain.

People in Laguna Beach weren’t waiting for the next downpour to get ready. Residents grabbed carloads of sandbags from city trucks. Work crews lined streets with bales of hay. And at Laguna Beach hardware stores, clerks struggled to keep up with a steady stream of customers demanding cleaning and roofing supplies, plywood and tarps to help guard against the threat of future floods.

Even before day’s end at Coast Hardware on Broadway Place, the store had sold out of plastic sheets that could be used for covering yards.

“A lot of people were just not prepared for the slide as they should have been,” said Rick Howe, a paint mixer at the store.

Officials with the county Environmental Management Agency ordered five truckloads of concrete partitions to be erected in areas prone to erosion to prevent further flooding and mudslides. EMA officials said they did not immediately know how long it will take or where all the sections of 20-foot partitions, called K-rails, will be placed, but the areas where homes were damaged Thursday are first on the priority list.

“They’re basically going to work like the hay bales, but they’re larger and more rigid,” said Ed Sabins, a geologist who was anticipating some K-rails to be delivered into the canyon near Park Avenue, one of the areas worst hit by mud. Sabin, whose Denver firm also worked in the aftermath of the Oakland fires two years ago, was assisting Laguna Beach city officials with flood and mudslide prevention measures.

Among the 13 homes that were damaged by mud and water, six families were evacuated Thursday. Four were allowed to returned to their homes Friday. The Orange County chapter of the American Red Cross placed the other two families at local hotels.

At the Irvine Bowl, a 10-foot wall of mud had roared through the first story of the stage building, taking everything in its path, such as props, makeup, lighting equipment and research art books, said Jon Tschirgi, the amphitheater’s audio and lighting engineer.

“Some of our props were found on the main beach, a quarter of a mile away,” he said. “I guarantee you, the pageant will be on next summer. But if you look at it now, you’d wonder how we’d do it. The loss is incredible.”

Among the hardest hit neighborhoods was Canyon Acres, a funky conglomeration of rustic homes off Laguna Canyon Road, and a quaint section of the city behind Laguna Beach High School.

The slides marked the next round of calamity for this artsy beachfront enclave of 25,000. Two weeks ago, devastating wildfires destroyed more than 300 homes and blackened about 16,000 acres in the canyons and residential areas around Laguna Beach. Damage totaled at least $280 million.

The Laguna Beach City Council will meet in special session at 9 a.m. today for an update on the fallout from the fire and the mudslides.

Despite the onslaught of mud and fast-rising water on Thursday, no serious injuries were reported, and by Friday, city, county and state workers had cleared much of the mucky debris from the hard-hit areas.

In other mudslide zones, which included Canyon Acres Drive, Hidden Valley Canyon Road, Skyline Terrace, Wilcox Drive and Wilson Street, hundreds of state, county and city crews were working feverishly to build sandbag and hay-bale walls to staunch or divert future flooding from properties. They also swept streets and cleared the many storm drainages that were plugged up.

“All city forces . . . are trying to ensure that all things will work when more rain comes,” said Brandt. The crews are concentrated in those areas of the city with the most potential for problems, particularly in the neighborhoods already hit by flooding.

“Those are the areas which have the larger watersheds,” Brandt said. “Not much work is being done in Laguna Canyon. We are concentrating our work in the residential areas of the city.”

Residents, too, joined in the back-breaking work. Their efforts include stacking up sandbags around their houses and businesses or covering their yards with plastic tarps to prevent water from further saturating their years and causing slides.

Kea Simon, 54, whose home is perched on a steep slope on Hillview Drive, spent most of Friday supervising about a dozen of day laborers who placed 30,000 square feet of jute mesh over her lawn and that of her neighbor. Simon estimated that the work will cost about $18,000. The rain washed in a five-inch sheet of mud that covered her lawn and barely stopped at her front door.

Simon figures that in the time it takes for the city and county workers to reseed the area, her house might crash down the hill in another rainstorm. “We’ll be sitting on Laguna Canyon Road,” she quipped.

“This was a (small) rain,” said Simon, 54. “What’s going to happen when we really get a rain ?”

Several miles away, other residents were asking the same question as they stopped by a Laguna Canyon Road parking lot where city trucks had dumped giant mounds of sand and set aside bags for those who want them. A steady stream of people stopped by throughout the day to stuff sandbags they hope would prevent mudslides and flooding into their properties.

“It wasn’t that much and look at the damage it did,” said Lee Leary, whose Forest Avenue shop, Laguna Gander, was flooded. “I’m just crossing my fingers that the next rain won’t come too fast, too much or too soon.”

City officials said if the weather forecast holds, they will use the next few days to further shore up the damaged areas and other parts of Laguna Beach. More than 100,000 sandbags were given to residents before the rain and Brandt said he expects that at least that many will be handed out this week.

Even if the K-rails are placed in some areas, Brandt said, the sandbags and hay bales will still have to bear much of the burden for stemming mud and water flow. Straws from broken hay bales will also be spread in some barren slopes to soak up water.

But if torrential rains come, the straws from hay bales could clog up storm drains, geologists and city officials agreed. But without the straw on the hillsides, the erosion and subsequent damage would be much worse, said Richard W. Whitaker, a geologist with Bogseth-Hetherington Inc., a geotechnical firm in Mission Viejo.

Even if rain doesn’t strike this scarred city until next week as predicted, any downpour in the near future could still defeat preventive measures being taken in the meantime.

“Where you have relatively continuous sandbagging and plastic sheeting, you will mitigate the problem,” said Gregory Axten, president and principal engineer at American Geotechnical in Anaheim, a firm that works all over the state to help prevent storm damage. But in Laguna where “so much is burned . . . it will be hard to cover” all of the scorched properties.

“If there is a heavy rainfall, I would expect a lot of those efforts to be overwhelmed,” Axten said. And with the fires occurring so close to the rainy season, he added, “about all people can do in addition to what has already been done is pray a lot.”

This weekend’s forecast calls for winds of up to 25 to 30 m.p.h. Clear skies and cooler weather should continue until next week before rain hits at the end of the week, said James C. McCutcheon, a meteorologist for WeatherData, which tracks weather for The Times.

Thursday’s rain did not cause any major problem with sewage overflows that could threaten the beaches, according to county marine and sewage treatment officials. However, health officials advise swimmers to stay out of areas in the ocean close to storm drains and creek outlets.

“There is some overflow on Main Beach,” said Fire Capt. Scruggs. “While we are concerned about the environmental impact, right now our top priority is to make sure any damage resulting from more rain is kept to a minimal.

“After that, maybe we can breath a little easier and tackle other pressing matters.”

Times staff writers Jennifer Brundin and Anna Cekola contributed to this report.

* ONLY MEMORIES REMAIN: Canyons Acres residents realize way of life is gone. A34

* RESEEDING MAY BEGIN SOON: Plans to reseed charred hillsides stir controversy. A36