Reporting from Montecito, Calif. — Teams of rescuers waded through hillsides blanketed by mud and debris looking for victims of mudflows that killed at least 17 people as the full scope of California’s deadliest flooding event in several decades came into grim focus.
As firefighters dug through battered homes, helicopters searched from the sky for survivors who might be trapped behind roads made impassable by downed power lines and waist-high muck. In the Romero Canyon area above Montecito, scores have been marooned since Tuesday morning.
As of Wednesday afternoon, 17 people remained missing. Officials fear the death toll could rise because firefighters have not yet been able to access some areas in the path of the debris flows. Intense rain Tuesday morning pounded steep terrain burned by the Thomas fire just weeks earlier, unearthing a wall of mud, rocks and debris that raced down creek beds so quickly that residents didn’t have time to get out of harm’s way. While Though no victims have been formally identified, the dead include some children.
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The deluge destroyed at least 100 single-family homes, and damaged another 300 residences. An additional eight commercial properties had been wiped out as the mud flowed down through the upscale hillside community and onto the 101 Freeway, which is expected to remain closed through next week.
With gas, water and electricity knocked out in most of the area, rescue workers were concerned that many of those trapped could run short on supplies.
“A majority of Montecito and that whole area is in the Stone Age right now,” said Mike Eliason, public information officer for the Santa Barbara County Fire Department. “We’re actively pursuing trying to get in there as quick as we can to get those people to safety.”
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Frantic family and friends of the missing took matters into their own hands.
With a shovel in one hand, a man who asked to be identified only as Mikey smoked a cigarette and began removing mud and debris from the intersection of Hot Springs and Sycamore Canyon roads.
He had been out since 5 a.m. looking for his girlfriend’s missing sisters, Morgan and Sawyer Corey.
“They are good people,” he said with tears in his eyes. “I’m hoping to find them.”
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Contractors for the city of Ventura work to clear a huge tree toppled by wind on South Chestnut street between Main and Santa Clara Streets in downtown Ventura on Tuesday morning.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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A car was stuck in a mudslide early Tuesday morning on Topanga Canyon Blvd., in Topanga.
(Katie Falkenberg / Los Angeles Times)
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Mario Romero looks at mud debris covering Maricopa Highway 33 North of Ojai that has several closures due to mud and debris slides covering the roadway Tuesday morning.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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Debris and mud cover the entrance of the Montecito Inn after heavy rain brought flash flooding and mudslides to the area.
(Daniel Dreifuss / Associated Press)
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A rainbow appears over the deadly mudslide in Montecito along Olive Mill Road.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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A man walks by destruction along Olive Mill Road in Montecito.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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A sheriffs deputy stands near a body covered by a tarp near Hot Springs Road in Montecito after a deadly mudslide swept through the area.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Mangled cars are stuck near Olive Mill Road in Montecito after a major storm hit the burn area Tuesday.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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A mangled car along with other debris is wrapped around a tree along Hot Springs Road in Montecito.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Scene from the 300 block of Hot Springs Road in Montecito following debris and mud flow due to heavy rain Tuesday morning.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Sheriffs deputies carry a body from the debris near Hot Springs Road in Montecito after a major storm hit the burn area Tuesday.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times )
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Orange County search-and-rescue crews look for missing people along Olive Mill Road and Hot Springs Road in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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A house is left among boulders and mud along Glen Oaks Drive in Montecito.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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The 101 Freeway is covered with mud and debris at Olive Mill Road in Montecito.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Montecito resident Terry Connery, second from left, is assisted on Wednesday by, from left, firefighters Mark Todd, John Cecena and Jeff Shea after the storm.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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A home off of Romero Canyon Road in Montecito is inundated with mud.
(Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)
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Crews work to clear debris from the closed 101 Freeway at Olive Mill Road in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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The 101 Freeway remains closed as mud and debris clog the roadway at the Olive Mill Road overpass in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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A member of the search and rescue team inpsects property near a home along Glen Oaks Drive in Montecito.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Ventura County fire Capt. Clay Cundiff searches a home for a woman who was reported missing by friends and family on Lilac Drive and Tollis Avenue in Montecito. She was later found safe.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
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A member of the San Bernardino Search and Rescue holds a picture that was found along the East Cold Springs Creek in Montecito after a major storm hit the burn area Wednesday.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Tim O’Donnell, a member of the L.A. County Search and Rescue team, searches under Ashley Road along the East Cold Springs Creek in Montecito after a major storm hit the burn area Wednesday.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Travis Zehntner looks over the wreckage of a Glen Oaks Drive home where family friend Rebecca Riskin was killed.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
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A home on West Park Lane along San Ysidro Creek in Montecito on Thursday.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
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A Cantin family holiday card in a pile of debris in the 300 block of Hot Springs Road in Montecito. From left, Kim, mother who survived; father David, who was killed; son Jack, who is still missing; and daugher Lauren, who was pulled from the family home early Wednesday.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
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A structure sits in a tree Friday on East Valley Road in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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A dog and its handler from Riverside County search the rubble of a Hot Springs Road home Friday in Montecito.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
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Water rises high near a home on East Valley Road on Friday in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times )
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A dog helps rescue workers search through rocks, mud and debris for bodies Saturday in Montecito.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Firefighters look for missing people along Hot Springs Road in Montecito on Saturday.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
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Los Angeles City firefighter Jeffrey Neu gives water to Faith, a cadaver dog, while searching in a wood pile in Montectio Creek.
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
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A Montecito freeway sign sits in mud on Highway 101.=
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
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A view of the Thomas Fire burn zone and San Ysidro Creek in the Santa Ynez Mountains which brought mud and debris into Montecito neighborhoods.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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Los Angeles City firefighter Hollyn Bullock uses a rescue tool to pry open a car door along Montecito Creek.
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
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Montecito neighbors hug at a candlelight vigil outside the Santa Barbara Courthouse.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Mourners gather for a candlelight vigil outside the Santa Barbara Courthouse Sunday for victims of the Montecito mudslides.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Geness Lorien listens to speakers during a candlelight vigil outside the Santa Barbara Courthouse.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Mourners gather for a candlelight vigil outside the Santa Barbara Courthouse Sunday for victims of the Montecito mudslides.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
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Mark Vance shovels mud away from his house on Olive Mill Road in Montecito, California.
(Katie Falkenberg / Los Angeles Times)
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Jesse Rudnick, with the Regional Task Force 1 out of Marin County Fire and Rescue, searches for missing people around a Montecito home.
(Katie Falkenberg / Los Angeles Times)
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Hugo Bautista, left and Jose Garcia, contractors with Union Pacific Railroad make sure track is clear at the Olive Mill Road crossing in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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Amtrak has added extra trains and cars for passengers trying to get around the 101 Freeway closure in Montecito.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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Crews continue to clear mud and debris from the 101 Freeway near Olive Mill Road on Tuesday, January 16, 2018. Officials said they hoped to have the freeway opened by next Monday.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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Cal Trans crews work on clearing a drain along the 101 Freeway in Montecito on Tuesday, January 16, 2018.
(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
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A worker takes a breather from directing a bulldozer driver who clears mud from the 101 freeway in Montecito.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
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Progress is slowly being made as a worker and trucks traverse a recently cleared portion of the the 101 freeway at Olive Mill Road in Montecito.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
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Santa Barbara Supervisor Joan Hartmann, from front left, Jefferson Litten, Hartmann’s Chief of Staff, and San Barbara City Councilman Eric Friedman, pink shirt, join others as they applaud first responders, fire fighters and law enforcement who’ve been aiding in the aftermath of the Montecito mudslide during a community meeting at the La Cumbre Junior High School in Santa Barbara.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
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Margaret Stewart, with the Los Angeles City Fire Department, watches as her dog, Veya, tries to locate a victim of the mudslide along Highway 101 at Olive Mill Road in Montecito.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
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As he waded through deep mud, Montecito resident Ben Ekler said his friend’s mother and two children were swept away during Tuesday morning’s deluge. The mother and one of the children were found and are recovering at a hospital, he said. But the other child is still missing.
“I thought we could help and do something,” Ekler said. “But nothing remains of their house.”
Social media posts sought information about a missing woman, Fabiola Benitez, and her son. Friends said the woman’s house was destroyed in the deluge. Benitez’s husband and another son were taken to a hospital, but the woman and her younger child had not been heard from.
Some of the searches had happy endings.
Sally Mobraaten, 56, arrived at an evacuation center at Santa Barbara City College on Monday night desperately looking for her her missing 86-year-old mother. She believed her mother had been evacuated but could not find her.
Nearly in tears, Mobraaten spoke with a Red Cross volunteer outside the shelter.
“I’m not sure where she could be,” the volunteer said.
Mobraaten decided to head toward a Vons on Coast Village Road where the National Guard had been dropping people off.
Along the way she called hotels in Santa Barbara to see if her mother was there. She had no luck. But in the Vons parking lot she saw an elderly woman wearing a red rain coat and a white hat.
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“Thats my mother!” she shouted.
With the engine of her SUV still running, Mobraaten jumped out, ran to her mother and gave her a kiss.
Mud and debris surrounds homes in Montecito on Wednesday.
(Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times )
The mudslides began around 2:30 a.m. Tuesday, when residents in their path were likely asleep. A number of homes were ripped from their foundations, with some pulled more than half a mile by water and mud before they broke apart.
Some of the hardest hit areas in Montecito were outside the burn scar of the Thomas fire and not subject to mandatory evacuations, Eliason said. Soil scorched by wildfires is less able to absorb water, which increases the chance it will be dislodged and cause a mudslide.
Helicopters and rescue workers from the U.S. Coast Guard and National Guard, as well as firefighters and helicopters from fire departments in Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties, have all descended on Montecito since Tuesday, Eliason said. An airship with night-vision capabilities hovered over the damage late Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, as rescue crews refused to spare a minute in their search.
Helicopters with hoist capabilities had begun making runs into Romero Canyon to rescue people, Anderson said. Ground crews were also making slight progress in clearing roadways leading toward Highway 192 and the Birnam Wood Golf Club, which were only accessible by air on Tuesday, authorities said.
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Many were concerned that last month’s wildfires had made the area ripe for dangerous mudslides. But some residents said the exhaustion of being chased from their homes made them hesitant to evacuate a second time.
Along Eleven Oaks Lane, David Cradduck, 66, was trying to shovel shin-high mud away from his home. In 34 years living in Montecito, he had never seen anything like Tuesday morning’s deluge.
“Mother Nature came back and dealt us a big blow, but it’s our fault,” he said. “We should have heeded the warning.”
When she first stepped out of her home Tuesday, Maude Feil said her Montecito Shores neighborhood looked “like an apocalypse happened.”
Feil had to evacuate during the Thomas fire and said she was worried that survivors who managed to get through the wildfire unscathed may have lost everything they own in Tuesday’s debris flows.
“I’ve never been so close to a fire in my whole entire life, then this,” she said. “People who didn’t lose their house in the fire — they just lost huge things in the mud.”
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As she moved around the area, careful not to slip in the mud, she recalled a grim discovery she made Tuesday among the wreckage. As she tried to look around her battered neighborhood, Feil said she spotted what she initially thought was a mannequin beneath railroad tracks.
“It was a woman’s body,” she said.
Mejia and Etehad reported from Montecito. Queally reported from Los Angeles.
Brittny Mejia is a Metro reporter covering federal courts for the Los Angeles Times. Previously, she wrote narrative pieces with a strong emphasis on the Latino community and others that make up the diversity of L.A. and California. Mejia was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2021 in local reporting for her investigation with colleague Jack Dolan that exposed failures in Los Angeles County’s safety-net healthcare system that resulted in months-long wait times for patients, including some who died before getting appointments with specialists. She joined The Times in 2014.
Former Los Angeles Times staff writer Melissa Etehad is an Iranian American who enjoys writing about national and international issues. She received her master’s in journalism from Columbia University and a bachelor’s in international affairs from UC San Diego and has reported from the Middle East and Europe. She previously worked at Al Jazeera English and the Washington Post’s foreign desk, where she covered the intersections of politics, religion and gender. She’s a native Farsi speaker.
James Queally writes about crime and policing in Southern California, where he currently covers Los Angeles County’s criminal courts, the district attorney’s office and juvenile justice issues for the Los Angeles Times.
