Major Storm to Wallop Saturated O.C.

For months, El Nino observers have worried about the sky falling. Today may be the day it actually happens.

Another major storm is expected to roll though Orange County by noon, dumping as much as 7 inches of rain on vulnerable foothill areas and again testing the flooding safeguards in coastal cities. The deluge is also expected to overwhelm Irvine Lake, create roadway havoc for commuters and flood low-lying areas.

“We’re expected to get walloped,” Orange County Fire Authority spokesman Capt. Scott Brown said Sunday. “Everything is so soggy, so saturated already that there is a significant potential for trouble.”

A new low-pressure system, stronger than the one that gave the West Coast a wet weekend, is expected to move onshore across Central California early this morning, sending showers southward that will grow stronger in the afternoon, forecasters said.

Canyon and hill slopes across the county are so soaked that “nothing is going into the ground,” and the approaching rain will have county residents and emergency crews scrambling for sandbags, said Bill Reiter, director of the Orange County storm center.

A flash-flood advisory was issued for today for Orange County and Southern California, and the approaching “power-packed storm” likely will prompt high surf advisories, said Mark Moede of the National Weather Service.

Irvine Lake, already swollen from a series of storms, will likely spill over before sunrise Tuesday, Reiter said. Crews were making plans Sunday to open dam gates to release the overflow into Santiago Creek--an emergency move performed only a half dozen times in the past decade and never so early in the rainy season, Reiter said.

Twenty-nine years ago this week, when Santiago Creek handled a similar torrent, the waters rose to flood parts of south Santa Ana, “wrecking houses, garages and bridges,” Reiter said. That type of damage is not expected now, mainly because of infrastructure improvements, but officials say the storm bearing down on the county has the potential to be among the worst of the bruising 1998 season.

“It’s going to be a big storm, one of the more significant,” Reiter said. “It’s similar to the Dec. 6 downpour, but that was isolated and this is widespread. But we’re hoping it won’t be disaster-level.”

A series of slight rain showers likely will start before dawn and build in intensity until noon, with thunderstorms and pelting rain that likely will continue through the afternoon, said meteorologist Wes Etheridge of WeatherData, which provides forecasts for The Times. “The good news is: It is a quick-moving storm and should move on,” he said, followed by higher temperatures as early as Tuesday.

By midday Wednesday, temperatures could climb into the mid-60s, Etheridge said.

The threat today is timing--the storm will follow on the heels of steady soakings that have pounded, flooded and drenched Orange County throughout the month, raising the risk of major slides and rising water. “Any rainfall between now and the end of the rainy season is going to be trouble,” Etheridge said.

More trouble is the last thing weather-weary Orange County residents want.

Lt. Governor Gray Davis on Friday declared a state of emergency in the county, where officials say damage estimates have already topped $5 million. That number--for roads, sidewalks, beaches and other public areas--doesn’t include hundreds of car crashes on slippery roads or water damage to homes in Huntington Beach, Irvine and other communities, where rain and mud have invaded living rooms and patios.

Today’s storm also will follow weekend showers that dropped “a whole lot of rain” on the north and east ends of the county, including 11 inches on the highest spot, Santiago Peak, county officials said.

Another area hit hard Sunday was Ventura County, where 10 people were evacuated from an apartment building threatened by a mudslide. That group joined 12 families forced to flee last week from another building on the same block of west Ventura’s Cedar Street.

Meanwhile, a separate mudslide caused the rupture of a crude oil pipeline in the hills north of Ventura, spilling 168 gallons.

The showers on Sunday kept emergency workers busy there and in several trouble spots in Orange County, among them:

* Santiago Canyon Road. It remained barricaded between Jamboree Road and Silverado Canyon Road, a closure now expected to last through Friday. The road was closed Tuesday when the pavement began to give way after heavy rains ruptured a storm drain beneath it. Repairs were postponed Sunday as more rain fell. “You can’t work in mud,” Reiter said.

* The Aliso Creek channel. A “major erosion concern” threatened to undermine a large natural gas line, and workers scrambled Sunday to divert water away from the crumbling area, Reiter said. This morning, crews will bring in truckloads of rock to bolster the ground around the pipe.

* Live Oak Canyon Road. It was closed indefinitely at Trabuco Creek, where rising waters covered the road near O’Neill Regional Park and made for treacherous conditions, Reiter said. “The water is 18 inches above the road,” he said.

* The stretch of Carbon Canyon Road between La Vida Road in Brea and the San Bernardino County line. It was closed for several hours after a huge tree fell across the roadway, blocking passage, police said.

* Laguna Beach. City crews and residents worked all day Sunday to gird for mudslide threats, and Laguna Canyon Road was closed between the San Diego Freeway and El Toro Road for much of the day to clear debris from a small mudslide. The winding thoroughfare--often closed during the rainy season--was expected to be clear and open by this morning.

* Dana Point. Crews worked on threatened slopes in several parts of the city, shoring them up and spreading tarps to shield them from “the big one” expected today, Reiter said. It was the third day of concerted shoring efforts by county work crews in the coastal city.

* Boats docked in the harbors off Huntington Beach, Newport Beach and Dana Point. Vessels were battered all weekend by fast, debris-laden currents gushing out of flood channels, said Sgt. Mike Hiller of the Orange County Sheriff’s Harbor Patrol. Moored boats will be closely watched today for damage and encroaching water. “It can be a devastating current,” he said. “We expect to get hit pretty good.”

Indeed, emergency workers across the county expect to be racing today to respond to flooding and sliding threats, along with the rash of car crashes and minor disasters that can always be expected with the seasonal downpours, Brown said. Residents can help by slowing down on the roads or avoiding them all together.

“If you don’t have to drive today, don’t,” Brown said. “And if you do have to drive, exercise extreme caution and give yourself an extra hour to get wherever you’re going.”

Brown also cautioned “weekend warriors and thrill-seekers” to avoid the lure of flooded waterways and rural areas, which can become dangerous traps in storm conditions. On Sunday, groups of people in four-wheel drive vehicles gathered at Live Oak Canyon Road to attempt off-road excursions through the washed-out area, Brown said.

“It may look exciting and fun and all that, but these situations can be deadly,” Brown said. “If you play, you may pay. It also puts rescuers in harm’s way when we have to go in there and pull these people out.”

Times staff writers Steve Chawkins, Tini Tran and Abigail Goldman contributed to this report.

Geoff Boucher can be reached at (714) 966-5983. His e-mail address is [email protected]

* WEATHERING THE STORM: Teamwork by cities, O.C. helps keep damage to a minimum. B3

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Downpour

Within an 18-hour period over the weekend, Santiago Peak--the highest spot in Orange County--received more than 11 inches of rain. While Orange County Storm Center officials could not say immediately whether that total set a record, they noted that the single wettest day during last year’s rain season dropped just 5.71 inches on the peak. Weekend totals in inches across the county:

Anaheim: 1.32

Dana Point: 1.15

El Toro: 0.78

Newport Beach: 0.75

San Juan Capistrano: 1.35

Santa Ana: 1.13

Santiago Peak: 11.22

Seal Beach-Huntington Beach: less than 1

Modjeska-Santiago Canyon areas: 2.5 to 3

South County average: 1.32

Sources: Orange County Storm Center, WeatherData Inc.