More than 200,000 without power as deadly storm slams California
An intense and deadly winter storm is barreling into California, unleashing damaging winds, heavy rain and flooding, and feet of mountain snow.
On Tuesday afternoon and evening the powerful storm slammed into the San Francisco and Monterey bay areas, toppling trees and power lines, and cutting power to tens of thousands of customers. The National Weather Service received reports of at least one fatality because of a tree falling onto a vehicle in Portola Valley, a town in San Mateo County.
In Southern California, the same storm is dragging an atmospheric river into the coast, delivering heavy rain, snow and strong winds continued into Wednesday.
Statewide, more than 200,000 customers were without power Tuesday evening, down from nearly 250,000 earlier, according to utility tracker Poweroutage.us.
Stanford University said it had canceled Tuesday’s exams because of a power outage impacting its Stanford campus; its campuses in Redwood City and Menlo Park were also impacted.
As the storm neared central California on Tuesday afternoon, intense thunderstorms barged into the area between San Francisco and Monterey, prompting severe thunderstorm warnings for destructive winds up to 80 mph.
Santa Cruz, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties were particularly hard hit.
Wind gusts of up to 59 mph were clocked in Monterey and up to 76 mph in the Santa Cruz mountains, downing numerous trees and power lines.
Downpours associated with the storms also spurred several instances of flooding.
Meteorologists were awestruck by two intense zones of low pressure orbiting each other just offshore the Bay Area, which triggered the powerful storms.
Early in the evening, the low-pressure zones consolidated and made landfall near San Francisco, presenting a hurricane-like eye that further astonished meteorologists.
The San Francisco Bay Ferry operated sporadically Tuesday evening as strong winds at one point created “unsafe conditions” at its boatyard in Alameda, across the bay from San Francisco, preventing the ferries from being pulled out of their berths.
The atmospheric pressure dropped to a March record low in San Francisco as winds gusted to 62 mph. The lower the pressure, the stronger the storm.
High winds also hit Southern California earlier Tuesday, with gusts over 100 mph in the high terrain and topping 50 mph at the coast.
Unrelenting stormy weather has left the ground waterlogged, with creeks, rivers and reservoirs swelling. Snow continues to accumulate in the Sierra Nevada, reaching historic levels in many areas.