The first tropical storm to hit Los Angeles in more than 80 years unleashed furious floods across parts of southern California more accustomed to drought, as officials urged the public to stay safe as they began to count the cost of damage.
The US National Weather Service downgraded the hurricane to a tropical depression, but not before California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency for much of southern California, with flash flood warnings until at least 3am yesterday.
Mountain and desert areas could get 12 to 25cm of rare rain, as much as the deserts typically see in a year, forecasters said.
Photo: AFP
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said she was still worried that people could let down their guard if Hilary left them initially unharmed, but later bands of the storm swung back to surprise those who were not prepared.
“We know that it could get much worse,” Bass told a news briefing on Sunday. “My concern is that people will be a little dismissive and go out when we need people to stay at home, to stay safe.”
Hilary’s center was yesterday expected to move quickly across Nevada, with the storm forecast to dissipate later in the day, the weather service said.
The storm had passed northward through Mexico’s Baja California peninsula. It killed at least one person in Mexico, triggering flash flooding and sweeping away roads.
Images on social media showed raging, muddy torrents gushing down eroded streets.
It crossed the border on Sunday afternoon, hitting San Diego county with its first tropical storm ever recorded and becoming the first to pelt Los Angeles county since 1939.
San Bernardino county, to the east of Los Angeles, ordered evacuations of towns in the mountains and valleys where social media images showed torrents of water, mud, rock and trees.
In more populated Ventura county northwest of Los Angeles, the weather service warned of life-threatening flooding from heavy rains, which dumped up to 5cm of rain within two hours.
US President Joe Biden ordered federal agencies to move personnel and supplies into the region.
Officials said Los Angeles county’s 75,000 homeless people were especially vulnerable, as were hillside canyons and areas recently denuded by wildfires.
As a precaution, the two largest school districts in the state, in Los Angeles and San Diego, canceled school yesterday.
The storm stunned people in the nearby town of Rancho Mirage, where water and debris rushed over closed roads and stranded at least one pickup truck in water that rose nearly to the top of its bed.
“It’s quite amazing. I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Sean Julian, 54, a resident of the town. “I’m seeing a lot more trees down. And there’s a big tree that just fell over there, and I probably shouldn’t be out here.”
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while