Swollen creeks and rivers Monday overflowed as an intense storm drenched the Bay Area and the central coast, forcing evacuations on the Monterey Peninsula, stranding homeless people near Coyote Creek, inundating a San Jose mobile home park and closing Niles Canyon Road in Fremont.
The heaviest rainfall saturated Big Sur in Monterey County (5.91 inches), followed by the mountains west of Santa Rosa in Sonoma County (5.6 inches) and Boulder Creek in Santa Cruz County (5.3 inches) in the 24-hour period ending 4 p.m. Monday.
Whipped by strong winds, trees snapped, including a huge redwood on Highway 17 near Summit Road. The tree, which fell about 3 p.m., blocked traffic in both directions. But a group of enterprising commuters — some with chainsaws — managed to clear the southbound lanes of the thinner end of the tree within about 45 minutes, witnesses said. The northbound lanes were reopened by road crews late Monday afternoon.
“Some people brought out brooms and began sweeping,’’ commuter Liza Miller said. “There was this amazing sense of ‘Let’s just get it done. We can do this.’”
But the free-flowing trattic didn’t last long. About an hour later, a rockslide near Los Gatos closed the two southbound lanes on the serpentine highway.
With California’s historic drought headed for the history books, San Jose and San Francisco got enough rain to join the list of cities that so far this season have exceeded their totals for the entire rainy season. Oakland, Concord, Redwood City and Santa Cruz had already hit that mark.
“It’s unprecedented,’’ National Weather Service meteorologist Steve Anderson said. “It’s one of the wettest years on record so far.’’
The storm was a rude awakening for Craig Silliman, who lives in the South Bay Mobile Home Park in North San Jose and was barred by firefighters from driving in.
“I didn’t even know there was a creek there,’’ Silliman said. “I’ve lived here for 10 years and never had anything like this happen.’’
San Jose fire Capt. Mitch Matlow discovered about 8 inches of standing water in the back section of the park Monday afternoon, affecting 30 to 40 homes. Work crews brought in vehicles to pump water out of the park and back into the creek.
In the East Bay, Fremont’s Niles Canyon Road was closed because of flooding and a mudslide. The Sullivan underpass was also flooded.
A levee break along the San Joaquin River prompted an evacuation order Monday night for about 500 people living in mainly ranch and farmlands near Manteca. But crews quickly patched the breach, San Joaquin County authorities said.
Power outages were reported throughout the region, including Richmond, Union City and San Francisco. Parts of East San Jose and San Jose’s westside neighborhood of Willow Glen also went dark.
Anderson Reservoir in Santa Clara County, which reached capacity Saturday, continued Monday to flow over the spillway into Coyote Creek. Crews also have been releasing water into the creek since early last month through an outlet, said Gina Adriano, a spokeswoman for the Santa Clara Valley Water District.
Once water flowing over the spillway reaches 2,000 cubic feet per second, officials will stop releasing water, with the peak flow expected Tuesday morning. But water could continue to cascade from the spillway, raising anxieties downstream.
Three homeless people were trapped Monday afternoon on land surrounded by fast-rising waters in Coyote Creek. The search and rescue team performed two rescues in the span of about 90 minutes along Coyote Creek, according to fire Capt. Matlow. The team had to use a boat to reach two of them and bring them to shore, navigating through vegetation and brush within the creek.
Worried about Coyote Creek, Happy Hollow Park over the weekend moved some of its animals from one of its zoo buildings to higher ground in crates. Turkey vultures, a macaw and African spurred tortoise were among those taken to its other zoo, where goats, sheep and miniature horses are kept, said zoo director Valerie Riegel.
“We did all of this before we needed to,” said Riegel, “so we wouldn’t have had to in a hurry.”
People living along a section of the Carmel River in Monterey County were told to leave, as were those in a neighborhood of Salinas near Santa Rita Creek and a few people in rural Royal Oaks, where a mudslide encroached on a home. The Monterey County Sheriff’s Office sent rugged Humvees out to help with the evacuations.
The Carmel River, which has flooded several times in the past month, was expected to rise to nearly 11 feet by Tuesday, which would be a moderate flood stage, while the Salinas River near Spreckels could reach nearly to the moderate flood stage of 26 feet by Tuesday night, which could inundate the Monterey-Salinas Highway.
The Big Sur River reached its moderate flood stage of 10 feet Monday morning and was expected to crest at 12 feet.
“The ground is saturated, and all rainfall at this point is increasing not only the pooling along the lower-lying elevations but also the river levels,” said Eric Ulwelling, a division chief with the Monterey County Regional Fire District.
In the San Joaquin Valley, residents patrolled levees for signs of danger, reviewing evacuation plans and filling hundreds of sandbags as the San Joaquin River kept rising.
“Our community is pulling together like real champs,” said San Joaquin River Club resident Paula Martin, who is helping coordinate emergency plans for the private neighborhood of 800 homes in Tracy.
In the mountains, the weather service forecast heavy snow in the Lake Tahoe area with a high avalanche danger until Tuesday in an area of the Sierra Nevada from Yuba Pass to Ebbetts Pass.
Forecasters said the winter storm could drop up to 5 feet of snow in areas above 7,500 feet while lower elevations could see between 8 and 24 inches of snow.
Moderate to heavy rain along with snowmelt below 7,000 feet was expected to swell rivers and streams and increase the chance of flooding.
For the first time in more than 10 years, water flowed into Lake Berryessa’s unique spillway. The Monticello Dam Morning Glory Spillway, also known as the Glory Hole, operates similarly to a bathtub drain for the northern California lake. The last time it spilled over was in 2006.
Elsewhere, the water level kept falling at Oroville Dam, where a damaged spillway had raised major flood concerns and prompted the evacuation of 188,000 people a week ago.
The Associated Press, Monterey Herald and Santa Cruz Sentinel reporter Ryan Masters contributed to this report.
