SAN DIEGO — Tropical Storm Hilary inundated streets across Mexico’s arid Baja California Peninsula with deadly floodwaters Aug. 20 before moving over Southern California, where it swamped roads and downed trees, as concerns mounted that flash floods could strike in places as far north as Idaho that rarely get such torrential rain.
Forecasters said Hilary was the first tropical storm to hit Southern California in 84 years, bringing flash floods, mudslides, high winds, power outages and the potential for isolated tornadoes.
Hilary made landfall along the Mexican coast in a sparsely populated area about 150 miles south of Ensenada, then moved through mudslide-prone Tijuana, threatening the improvised homes that cling to hillsides just south of the U.S. border.
At least 9 million people were under flash-flood watches and warnings as heavy rain fell across normally sunny Southern California ahead of the brunt of the storm. Desert areas were especially susceptible along with hillsides with wildfire burn scars, forecasters warned.
Mud and boulders spilled onto highways, water overwhelmed drainage systems and tree branches fell in neighborhoods from San Diego to Los Angeles. Dozens of cars were trapped in floodwaters in Palm Springs and surrounding desert communities across the Coachella Valley. Crews pumped floodwaters out of the emergency room at Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage.
Crews on SR-98 near Calexico. Caltrans staff is suggesting you to stay home. Please drive with caution if you must go out. pic.twitter.com/G2V6i0tsXx
— Caltrans San Diego (@SDCaltrans) August 20, 2023
The Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second-largest school system, said all campuses would be closed on Aug. 21.
“There is no way we can compromise the safety of a single child or an employee, and our inability to survey buildings, our inability to determine access to schools makes it nearly impossible for us to open schools,” Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said at a media briefing. San Diego schools postponed the first day of classes from Aug. 21 to Aug. 22.
Southern California got another surprise in the afternoon as an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.1 hit near Ojai, about 80 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It was felt widely and was followed by smaller aftershocks. There were no immediate reports of major damage or injury, according to a dispatcher with the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office.
Hilary could wallop other Western states with once-in-a-century rains, with a good chance of it becoming the wettest known tropical cyclone to douse Nevada, Oregon and Idaho. Hilary was expected to remain a tropical storm into central Nevada early Aug. 21 before dissipating.
Cars maneuver around a plow clearing debris along a flooded Sierra Highway in Palmdale, Calif., Aug. 20. (Richard Vogel/Associated Press)
By the evening of Aug. 20, Hilary had moved over San Diego and was headed north into inland desert areas. Around midday, it had maximum sustained winds of 60 mph.
National Hurricane Center Director Michael Brennan said that while Hilary had weakened from a Category 4 hurricane, it’s the water, not the wind, that people should watch out for most — some areas could get as much rain in hours that they typically get in a year.
“You do not want to be out driving around, trying to cross flooded roads on vehicle or on foot,” Brennan said during a briefing from Miami. “Rainfall flooding has been the biggest killer in tropical storms and hurricanes in the United States in the past 10 years, and you don’t want to become a statistic.”
Hilary is just the latest major climate disaster to wreak havoc across the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Hawaii’s island of Maui is still reeling from a blaze that killed over 100 people and ravaged the historic town of Lahaina, making it the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century. Firefighters in Canada are battling that nation’s worst fire season on record.
A vehicle drives through a flooded freeway entrance in Palmdale, Calif., Aug. 20. (Richard Vogel/Associated Press)
The Mexican cities of Ensenada and Tijuana closed all beaches and opened a half-dozen shelters at sports complexes and government offices.
One person drowned Aug. 19 in the Mexican town of Santa Rosalia when a vehicle was swept away in an overflowing stream. Rescue workers saved four other people, said Edith Aguilar Villavicencio, the mayor of Mulege township.
Brennan said rainfall could reach between 3 and 6 inches in many areas. Forecasters warned it could dump up to 10 inches — a year’s worth of rain — in some isolated areas.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency. The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it has officials inside California’s emergency preparedness office and teams on standby with food, water and other help.
The weather service said tornadoes were possible in eastern San Diego County.
Authorities issued evacuation warnings Aug. 19 for Santa Catalina Island, urging residents and beachgoers to decamp for the mainland, and for several mountain and foothill communities in San Bernardino County. Orange County sent an alert for anyone living in a wildfire burn scar in the Santa Ana Mountains’ Silverado and Williams canyons.
A motorist removes belongings from his vehicle after becoming stuck in a flooded street Aug. 20 in Palm Desert, Calif. (Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press)
Los Angeles authorities scrambled to get homeless people off the streets and into shelters, and officials ordered all state beaches in San Diego and Orange counties closed.
Across the region, municipalities ran out of free sandbags and grocery shelves emptied as people stockpiled supplies. California’s Joshua Tree National Park, Mojave National Preserve and Death Valley National Park were closed.
Death Valley’s Furnace Creek Visitor Center received more than 1 inch of rain by 1:30 p.m., with up to 3 inches more possible overnight. “For comparison, Furnace Creek’s average annual rainfall is 2.2 inches,” the park said in a statement, calling the rainfall “unprecedented.”
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To the north in Nevada, Gov. Joe Lombardo declared a state of emergency and activated 100 National Guard troops to assist with problems from predicted flooding in western Clark and Nye counties and southern Esmeralda County. In Arizona, wind gusts neared 60 mph in Yuma County, where officials gave out thousands of sandbags.
“I urge everyone, everyone in the path of this storm, to take precautions and listen to the guidance of state and local officials,” President Joe Biden said. Biden said in a later statement that he was being briefed on the storm and was prepared to provide federal assistance.
Meanwhile, one of several budding storm systems in the Atlantic Ocean became Tropical Storm Emily on Aug. 20, according to the National Hurricane Center. It was far from land, moving west in the open ocean. Also, Tropical Storm Franklin formed in the eastern Caribbean. Tropical storm watches were issued for the southern coasts of Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
