February 18,2017, 7:04:48AM,EST
One of the biggest storms in years bombarded Southern California with heavy rain and gusty winds to end the week.
The storm has caused to at least two fatalities. A large tree brought down power lines in Sherman Oaks, California, electrocuting a 55-year-old man. Additionally, one driver drowned in his car after flash flooding suddenly overtook the roadway.The heaviest rain has ended across the Los Angeles Basin and San Diego, but will shift farther inland across the Desert Southwest on Saturday.
Flooding may persist even after the heaviest rain has passed, so motorists should remain cautious when taking to the roads. Flooding, mudslides and downed trees may lead to additional travel delays on Saturday.
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Southern California Edison has restored power for some across the area. As of 11:00 p.m. PST, 53,000 customers remain without power.
Several roadways remains closed in the Santa Monica Mountains and Angeles National Forest areas due to rock slides and flooding. The reopening for most of those roads had yet to be determined.
A second death has been reported in California. According to CBS Los Angeles, a driver drowned in his car when sudden flash flooding overtook the road in Victorville earlier Friday evening. Witnesses say the man tried to cross the road when water seemingly appeared out of nowhere.
Three cars were stuck in the flood waters, but no other injuries were reported.
There have been several reports of sinkholes swallowing up vehicles around southern California. A fire truck reportedly fell into a sinkhole at the I-15 and Interchange highway 138 after a lane collapsed due to flooding in Wrightwood, California, around 8:15 p.m. PST.
Two cars reportedly fell in a sinkhole near Van Nuys around 8:30 p.m. No injuries have been reported.
As of 8 p.m. PST, 4.36 inches of rain have fallen in Santa Ynez, California, in the last 24 hours. Santa Barbara reported 4.14 inches, and Sandberg received 3.82 inches.
LAX reported 1.44 inches of rain in the last day. San Diego International Airport received 0.71 so far.
As of 6 p.m. PST, the heaviest rain was soaking areas from Los Angeles to San Diego along the I-5 corridor with a few gusty thunderstorms embedded in the rain.
A section of I-5 near Sun Valley was closed in both directions due to standing water on the highway, creating headaches for drivers during the Friday evening commute. Many other, smaller roads were temporarily closed due to fallen trees. Some of these trees also crushed nearby cars parked along the side of the road.
Over 60,000 customers were without electricity across the region for a time late Friday afternoon due to downed trees and power lines, but that number has begun to drop.
Road conditions continue to deteriorate across Southern California ahead of the evening commute.
AccuWeather Extreme Meteorologist Reed Timmer is in Oxnard, California where some roads are underwater and flood waters are starting to inundate low-lying houses.
As of 3 p.m. PST, nearly 30,000 electric customers are without power across Southern California, according to Southern California Edison.
Many of these outages have been caused by strong winds and falling trees. The number of outages may continue to rise heading into Friday night as gusty winds continue across the region.
One person has been seriously injured after a large tree brought down power lines and landed on a vehicle. The person may have suffered from an electrical shock and has been transported to a local hospital in serious condition, the Los Angeles Fire Department said.
The northbound lanes of US 101 north of Ventura, California has been closed due to several feet of mud on the freeway. This could contribute to travel delays throughout the Friday evening commute.
Strong winds are bringing down trees across California which may lead to travel delays and power outages.
Winds have been gusting to 40 mph around Los Angeles, but much stronger winds have been recorded at higher elevations. A 108-mph gust was recorded by MESONET near Grapevine, California, the highest wind gust reported so far from this storm.
Most flights out of John Wayne Airport in Orange County have been canceled today, including all Southwest and American flights.
Due to heavy rain and wind, there is a Traffic Management Program in effect for traffic arriving at Los Angeles International Airpot (LAX). According to www.faa.gov, some arriving flights are being delayed an average of 1 hour and 17 minutes.
There have been more than 900 flight delays and 400 flight cancellations at airports across California today, according to FlightStats.
The Santa Barbara County Sheriff Department has issued an evacuation warning for the greater Sherpa Fire Burn area.
As of 9:30 a.m. PST, more than 5,000 PG&E customers are without power in San Jose, California. Thousands more are without power in the Santa Cruz area.
As rain fell in Southern California, a large eucalyptus tree fell onto a carport in Goleta, about 10 miles from Santa Barbara, on Friday morning. No injuries were reported, but several cars were damaged.
Motorists survey the scene on Castroville Blvd. in north MoCo as several eucalyptus trees blocked all lanes of traffic @NWSBayArea #CAwx
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