Submerged highways, downed power lines and trees, mud-covered neighborhoods: Tropical Storm Hilary caused extensive damage in California, where authorities believe, Monday, August 21, to have avoided the worst after its passage.
This storm, very rare in southern California, broke daily precipitation records, according to the US Weather Services (NWS). Some places received a year’s worth of rain in 24 hours. In Oak Glen, a small village on the mountainside, located halfway between Los Angeles and Palm Springs, the deluge caused a large mudslide that invaded the streets, noted an Agence France-Presse photojournalist .
From slush to her knees, Brooke Horspool spent her morning clearing away to help her neighbors, whose garage was destroyed and who are still stuck at home.
“They can’t get out: if they open the door, the mud rushes into the house,” said the accountant, who has spent his entire life in the area. At 49, he witnessed the “worst flood” he had ever seen. Hilary made landfall on the Baja California peninsula in northwestern Mexico on Sunday. It caused the death of a person there, carried away with his vehicle by the waves.
In California, where a 5.1 magnitude earthquake also rocked the southern part of the state on Sunday, the worst seems to have been avoided. The metropolises of Los Angeles and San Diego, the most populated in the affected area, have not recorded any deaths linked to the storm, according to press conferences given by authorities on Monday.
However, they continue to urge caution. As a precaution, the Los Angeles school district, the second largest in the United States, chose to close its schools on Monday. Elsewhere, damage is still being assessed. The deluge transformed many highways into rivers, especially around Palm Springs, a city located about two hours from Los Angeles in the desert, which was cut off from the world.
“Right now, all our roads are flooded. You can no longer enter or leave Palm Springs, and this is the case for the majority of the Coachella Valley. We’re all stuck,” Mayor Grace Garner explained on CNN Monday morning. In the nearby town of Cathedral City, rescuers were evacuating residents trapped by mud and water by transporting them in backhoe loaders, noted an Agence France-Presse photojournalist.
The famous Death Valley National Park, known for its extreme temperatures, closed due to flash floods that hit the area. Despite record rainfall, southeastern California “escaped the worst-case flood scenarios,” said UCLA climatologist Daniel Swain. According to him, the rain “did not come as quickly as feared…and the impacts of the floods were fortunately not as catastrophic as they could have been.”
The storm now loses its strength. After its passage in Nevada, it should head for the states of Oregon and Idaho, further north. US President Joe Biden is closely monitoring the operations, according to the White House. He also arrived with the first lady, Jill Biden, in Hawaii on Monday to see the damage caused by the deadly forest fires and to learn about the search operations which are continuing.
Hilary is the first tropical storm of the season to make landfall on the Pacific side. According to scientists, storms are getting more powerful as the world warms with climate change. “We also need to look at what climate change has to do with these severe weather events,” federal disaster management agency chief Deanne Criswell told CNN. “What will risk look like in the future. »
