Photo: Mario Tama/Getty Images
A backyard swimming pool was left partially hanging over the edge of a cliff after an avalanche of rain caused by a atmospheric river in the south of California will cause ground slides this week.
The houses in the beachfront community of Saint Clement, in it orange County, were evacuated during the storm this week, Reuters reported.
The mudslides even caused a large section of the backyard of a San Clemente home to collapse, leaving the edge of the pool exposed and hanging off the cliff.
Several apartment buildings were evacuated Wednesday after a landslide in San Clemente left buildings nearly collapsing down a steep hillside.
Orange County Fire Authority crews responded around 8:20 a.m. in the 1500 block of Buena Vista. Residents were evacuated from buildings due to unstable conditions after the hillside gave way during a night of torrential rain.
The fire brigade photos show where a section of hillside slid under what appeared to be a backyard. The drone video also provided firefighters with an aerial view of the slide.
Buena Vista from Avenida Florencio to Calle Colina and the trail below have been closed.
No injuries reported. The Orange County Sheriff’s Department is assisting. pic.twitter.com/4QDrn8fjyR
— OCFA PIO (@OCFireAuthority) March 15, 2023
A total of four buildings have been red-tagged by a City of San Clemente building inspector and its residents have had to abandon them without being able to enter them, due to the danger they represent.
This occurred as California was experiencing its 11th atmospheric river this storm season.
Atmospheric rivers are long, narrow regions in the atmosphere, which carry most of the water vapor out of the tropics.
California’s atmospheric rivers form from hot water vapor rising from the Pacific Ocean and can carry the equivalent of the flow of water at the mouth of the Mississippi River.
Keep reading:
• Failure in the Pajaro River levee triples a few hours after the arrival of a new atmospheric river in Monterey County
• What is an atmospheric river, the meteorological phenomenon that has wreaked havoc in California
• Only 36% of California remains in drought conditions after storms