Residents in Southern California were surveying the damage after heavy rains brought flash flooding and landslides overnight.
The deluge battered communities from Santa Barbara to San Diego, with up to 8 inches of rain falling in some places, shattering rainfall records across the region, according to the National Weather Service.
The Los Angeles Fire Department said evacuations had been enforced in several areas after homes were hit by mudslides and debris flows. The weather service on Monday warned residents in the Hollywood Hills and around the Santa Monica Mountains to avoid traveling as those areas could get hit with life-threatening landslides and flash floods.
The storm is an atmospheric river, a ribbon of water vapor that moves through the sky. When it hits land, the water vapor rises and cools, turning into rain, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The storm barreled across the nation’s most populous state, leaving more than half a million customers without power Monday, according to PowerOutage.us.
“Heavy rainfall will be lingering across southern areas with the threat of flash floods continuing from L.A. to San Diego through Tuesday,” Bob Oravec, a meteorologist at the NWS, said Monday.
Flash-flood warnings were in effect for Santa Monica, West Hollywood and Beverly Hills.
About 4.1 inches of rain poured onto downtown Los Angeles on Sunday, breaking the daily record of 2.55 inches of rain set in 1927, according to the NWS. It was the third wettest day on record for February, with the high of 4.8 inches set in 1913.
The storm also broke rainfall records at Los Angeles International Airport, Long Beach Airport and Santa Barbara Airport, the weather service said.
Mudslides struck homes in the Studio City neighborhood of Los Angeles and debris flows were reported in Sun Valley, local officials said. Flash-flood warnings were in place for much of L.A. County into Monday morning, the NWS said.
Santa Barbara district schools were closed Monday. Los Angeles Unified School District remained open.
This is the second atmospheric river to pummel California in recent days. Around 30% to 50% of the annual precipitation on the West Coast occurs in just a few atmospheric-river events, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
In Northern California, wind gusts exceeding 100 miles an hour were recorded, according to the NWS. The local field office in Sacramento warned of local gusts up to 70 mph for a swath of the state north of San Francisco lasting into Monday morning.
Forecasters said the potential for hurricane-force winds would continue throughout Northern California on Monday.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency for eight counties and said the state had a record number of emergency assets on the ground. “This is a serious storm with dangerous and potentially life-threatening impacts,” he said.
A man was killed in Yuba City, roughly 40 miles north of Sacramento, Sunday when a large tree fell on him in his backyard, local police said.