Another mandatory evac, another long night ahead...

[P15-D24]

Well, Santa Barbara County just declared another mandatory evac for us tonight, 4th of the year. (Impact is 20K-30K people!)  My wife and I live in the western area of Santa Barbara and we are expecting rain and possible mudslides and flooding. You may remember in the news back in January the mudslides in Montecito that killed 22 people, (12 miles east, they are under the same mandatory evac order.)  We had a 18K acre fire in July in the mountains and canyon above us and we live on the creek that runs down the canyon. Heaviest rain will hit around 2-3 am. We are planning to shelter in place unless it starts to look dicey, then evac to our neighbors across the street who are at 100 feet higher elevation. Good news is the creek is about 40-50 below our house elevation, but you just never know with these events.  Full moon tonight will help, we should be able to at least see something. Animal carriers are staged, (3 cats, 2 dogs) flashlight charged, radios ready and overnight stuff packed. We have done this so many times we now just walk away, everything is backed up off site. If we stay and get cut off we have power, food and water for a couple weeks. (That's living in earthquake/wild fire county) Good news is the storm should be over by 5 or 6 am Friday morning.  Wish us luck. 

[pflaming]

Two of our children graduated from Westmont, so have been to your area many times. Our thoughts and prayers will be with you. 

 

Paul

[linus6948]

Wishing you the best of luck, stay safe.

[Bingster]

I was born and raised in California. Love Santa Barbara area. Our prayers are with you.

[P15-D24]

Good news, rain ended up less than forecast!   Creek is flowing pretty good but no flooding danger for this round. :-)

[busycoupe]

Glad you are OK.  New England is getting pounded by rain, wind, snow right now.  The coast is getting high tides 4 to 7 feet above normal. I am 50 miles inland at an altitude of 600 ft. So all we have is rain and wind, but my daughter lives on the coast south of Boston.  The waves breached the sea wall at the end of her street and flooded her basement with 1 to 2 ft of water.  They shut off their furnace and electrical service and are on their way to spend the weekend with us.  ..we are supposed to get 3 to 6 inches of snow after midnight. ... and to think, I was enjoying the early spring weather two days ago!

[John Rogers]

Im so glad that things turned out good and that there was no flooding. I cant even imagine having evac orders all the time. I got a warning to be prepared to evac a few weeks ago for a wildfire in the Dragoon Mtns. because some idiot decided to burn weeds with 25 mph winds in a grassy field. Luckily for us it was miles away so it didnt affect us here in town but I felt bad for the folks that did have to evac for the 2nd time in 7 months because of wildfires. Luckily this time around no one lost their life or homes. I feel so bad for yall in CA. You suffer thru so many wildfires then the mudslides that result from them, terrible !!!

                        John 

Edited March 3, 2018 by John Rogers

[P15-D24]

Worse part is the County is telling us to expect this for the next two years. Takes that long for new growth to start on the mountains because the heat from the fires cooks the ground down 6-9 inches. Good/bad news is we have only 2 more months of rainy season. But we do need the rain for the reservoirs.

[pflaming]

Is the ground damaged or the seeds and plant roots?

[P15-D24]

32 minutes ago, pflaming said:

Is the ground damaged or the seeds and plant roots?

Fire burned so hot it cooked the ground solid so nothing can take hold until it breaks down. Problem is water just runs off with no absorption.

[pflaming]

Wow, never thought about that!  So can't air seed quick growth plants. 

[P15-D24]

That and too steep for air seeding.