Winter Storms Pound Two U.S. Coasts
06:59 a.m. Feb 04, 1998 Eastern
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Swollen rivers overran their banks, emergency
crews struggled to shore up collapsing hillsides, and hundreds of people were
evacuated as a winter storm fueled by El Nino hit California.
One man near Palo Alto, south of San Francisco, was killed by a falling tree, and
hundreds of others were evacuated as the storm dumped up to 5 inches of rain
across parts of northern California.
''The tap sure is running,'' Diana Henderson of the National Weather Service said.
She said the storm's ferocity was due in part to this year's powerful El Nino
weather pattern, which causes a warming of Pacific waters off the coast of South
America and severe storms farther north.
''El Nino is not any one particular storm, but it is climate change. We are getting
copious amounts of rain from the south, which is indicative of that kind of effect,''
Henderson said.
Wild weather also hit southern Florida. The worst storm in five years blasted
through the Miami area Monday night, uprooting trees, damaging buildings, flooding
streets and leaving about 220,000 people without power.
One person was reported killed in the Florida Keys, while Florida emergency
officials warned that rivers were rising and flooding was likely in north and
north-central Florida.
That storm was blamed for heavy damage and four deaths in Cuba before it began
pushing up the U.S. Atlantic coast.
The National Weather Service dropped flash flood warnings for the San Francisco
area late Tuesday as the storm moved inland, leaving people to begin the cleanup.
Southern Californians too faced swamped streets and pounding rain.
Power was being restored to most customers after an estimated 145,000 homes lost
power along the coast after trees were blown into power lines, Leonard Anderson
of Pacific Gas & Electric said.
''This is the biggest storm we've had this winter, there's no question about it,'' he
said.
The storm barreled through the San Francisco Bay area Monday, blasting the coast
with winds of over 50 mph and drenching hillsides with more water than they could
handle.
Mudslides were reported across the region, closing roads and forcing evacuation of
houses and apartment blocks.
The region's rivers, including the Russian River near Guerneville, the Napa River in
Napa County and the Pajaro River in Monterey County all spilled over their banks
but crested only a couple of feet above flood stage.
''The river has started to recede. We don't feel at this point we are in any danger,''
Pamela Hansen of the Napa County Emergency Operations Center said.
Most of the 5,000 residents of the town of Pajaro, about 70 miles south of San
Francisco were evacuated as brown river water spilled across roads and fields, and
weather forecasters said it could be Wednesday before the flooding receded.
At Stanford University in Palo Alto, three buildings were flooded, including Green
Library, where student volunteers and library workers labored to box up some
120,000 books and move them to safety.
''The entire bottom shelf of books in the basement was soaked,'' Lisa Trei of the
Stanford News Service said.
In Petaluma, about 35 miles north of San Francisco, an estimated 1,000 people were
evacuated, many of them by boat, after the city declared a mobile home park and
nearby streets at risk for major flooding.
Water combined with raw sewage gushed into some 100 homes in the town of
Willows, 120 miles north of San Francisco, forcing more evacuations.
As Tuesday's storm receded, residents began to grow nervous about the next storm
on the horizon, which forecasters predict could hit the area as early as Wednesday
night.
The San Francisco area experienced a near-record 12.24 inches rainfall in January,
8 inches above normal. And weather forecasters expect February to be nearly as
wet, boosting the flood danger as more and more water flows into already
overloaded streams and rivers.
''It is not as strong as the storm we just had, but it definitely could bring some of
these flood problems back,'' Miguel Miller of the National Weather Service said.
In North Carolina, a slow-moving weather system, which was responsible for four
deaths in Cuba and another in Florida Tuesday, pounded Carolina beaches with
heavy rains and howling winds that produced flooding in low-lying coastal areas.
Gale warnings were raised from Savannah, Georgia, to Sandy Hook, New Jersey,
overnight Wednesday as one of the strongest winter storms of the year threatened
the southern Atlantic coast.
''This storm is stronger than the one last week. The big difference is this one is
slower moving, and the coastline will see several high tides with onshore winds
pushing the water higher,'' National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Sammler
said.
In North Carolina's Outer Banks, Dare County emergency managers warned that
the winter storm could be the worst in more than three decades. The Outer Banks
were still cleaning up from a storm last week that caused $1 million worth of
damage. Twenty homes were condemned and three fishing piers smashed by heavy
surf in that storm.
In the western North Carolina mountains, gusts of up to 82 mph were recorded as
the leading edge of the storm swept in on Tuesday. The ground remained saturated
by up to 3 feet of melting snow and rain in some sections of the central
Appalachians, and officials were bracing for widespread power outages as falling
trees downed power lines.
''It won't take a whole lot to topple some of those trees. A lot of trees up there
were damaged in Hurricane Hugo, Fran and some by Opal. There's a lot of
potential for downed timber and that's troubling,'' said Tom Hegele, a spokesman
with the North Carolina state emergency center in Raleigh.
In Charleston, South Carolina, officials reported minor beach erosion at Folly Beach
and some road closings. There were no confirmed injuries or deaths as the storm
moved into the area.
''The coast may have escaped a pounding last week, but I think they are going to
get a pounding out of this one,'' Hegele said.
In Florida, torrential rains and tornadoes spawned by the low pressure system
uprooted trees and left 91 families homeless in Greater Miami in the worst storm to
hit that area in five years, officials said.
A fisherman was killed in the Florida Keys near Key West, and about half a million
customers were left without power at the height of the storm, officials said.
In Havana, four people were reported killed and more than 100 homes were
damaged as strong winds and heavy rains lashed the Cuban capital late Monday,
Cuban state media said on Tuesday.
The Cuban news agency Prensa Latina said a teacher was crushed when a tree
fell on a school. The other state news agency, AIN, said three other people had
been killed, but gave no details.
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