Hurried cleanup of mud and debris under way in LA-area foothills with new storms coming

LA-area cleans up from storms, new round coming

LA CANADA FLINTRIDGE, Calif. — Homeowners shoveled mud from living rooms and workers scooped debris from catch basins in a foothill neighborhood slammed by weekend rains as yet another storm takes aim at the region.

Evacuated residents were allowed back into the mud-caked La Canada Flintridge area north of Los Angeles Sunday, where a day earlier 43 homes were damaged by rain-spawned mudslides. Nine of them were so badly damaged they’ve been deemed uninhabitable.

More than 500 homes were evacuated as mud and debris — surging down from foothills denuded of undercover by autumn wildfires — overflowed basins and flooded streets.

The power of the weekend storm surprised many.

“In my 20 years of fire service, this is the first time I’ve seen this much devastation caused by a weather system,” Los Angeles County Fire Battalion Chief Mike Brown said as he walked past ravaged suburban homes.

With another storm expected Tuesday, work crews would try to clear the debris basins as much as they could, but significant clearing could take weeks.

“We’re working around the clock to provide whatever capacity we can,” Department of Public Works spokesman Bob Spencer told the Pasadena Star-News.

Crews used 300 dump trucks along with bulldozers and other earth-moving machinery.

“That series of storms two weeks ago, we took about 300,000 cubic yards of material out of our debris basins,” Spencer said. “This is going to be about the same.”

Tons of boulders that clogged a basin inlet and helped spur Saturday’s overflow have been removed, Spencer said.

The still-soupy mud in the basins was incredibly difficult to remove the day after a storm, he said.

The mayor of La Canada Flintridge, Laura Olhasso, said Sunday the U.S. Forest Service should pay to help remove the mud and debris that came down the mountains from federal land burned by the fires.

“The federal government is not taking responsibility for the flow of mud that came from its property,” Olhassa said. “They say there’s nothing they can do to keep it from flowing, then they need to help clean it up. They need to be responsible property owners.”

Olhasso said the city has received “no assurances” of help from federal authorities.

“This is potentially a threat for the next three to five years, which is how long they say it could be before the vegetation grows back,” she said.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger toured the area Sunday. He said the three county sites set aside for mud disposal might not be enough.

“They need to clean up this area as quickly as possible. … They need permits for a fourth dumping site, disposal site, which have to come from the federal government and the state,” the governor said. “We all have to work together to help the people whose homes were damaged.”

A crew of about 100 yellow-vested church volunteers brought shovels Sunday to help residents clear out the muck from yards and garages and living rooms.

Volunteer John Day shuttled a wheelbarrow full of mud from the home of 64-year-old Pat Andersen’s house.

“Even though the Super Bowl is on, there’s no other place I’d rather be,” Day said.

Anderson had to flee her home with the help of a neighbor after grabbing her wedding rings and some clothes as mud rose in her living room Saturday.

“I’ve lived here almost 40 years and this was the worst it’s ever been,” she said after returning Sunday to find that the mud had swept her car through the garage wall, down a steep embankment and into her next door neighbor’s bedroom.

The mud in her living room was three feet deep and many of her belongings were buried even deeper in a neighbor’s pool, including a red wooden bar that had been at the center of neighborhood parties for about 35 years and was covered with tiny brass plaques commemorating the get-togethers.

Neighbor Tom Smith helped fish it out of the pool.

“We’ll wash it off, get it ready to go again,” Smith said.

Associated Press Writer Christopher Weber contributed to this report.