Homes Flood in Season’s 1st Big Storm

The first major storm of the season dumped up to 3 1/2 inches of rain on Southern California on Friday morning, flooding homes, streets and highways and collapsing part of the roof at the Movieland Wax Museum in Buena Park.

Police said there were twice as many traffic accidents as usual, and slick pavement slowed commuter routes to a crawl.

Runoff flooded about 100 low-lying homes and businesses in Seal Beach, a problem exacerbated by the failure of a drainage pump that apparently shorted out and caught fire.

Clogged drains caused flooding up to three feet deep in Sunset Beach, and water several feet deep closed some lanes of the Long Beach Freeway in Long Beach from 2:30 a.m. until about 8:30 a.m.

Several motorists were stranded briefly before dawn in some of the deepest puddles, but all of them waded to safety and tow trucks dragged their vehicles to higher ground.

More rain is expected by Sunday morning.

At the wax museum, a 20-foot by 30-foot section of roof caved in under the weight of tons of water that apparently failed to drain because of a clogged pipe. Most of the damage was to an office area, and museum officials said none of the wax figures were harmed.

At the Radisson Inn Seal Beach, some guests waded across the flooded parking lot to their cars, while others hitched rides in a bellhop’s cart.

A neighbor awakened Seal Beach residents James and Brandee Honn at 4 a.m. to warn them about the rising water. They were able to drive two of their cars to higher ground, but the third would not start. Their only resort was to push it by hand through water that was nearly waist deep.

“It was cold water,” James Honn said. “I couldn’t feel my feet for a while. It was numbing.”

Storm totals included 3.58 inches of rain at Big Rock Mesa near Malibu, 2.44 in the Sepulveda Pass, 1.94 in Torrance, 1.88 in Long Beach, 1.36 in Van Nuys, 0.88 of an inch in West Covina, 0.57 in Monrovia and 0.47 in Hawthorne.

The National Weather Service said 0.25 of an inch fell into downtown Los Angeles’ official rain gauge at USC, raising the total for the season, which runs from July 1 through June 30, to 0.66 of an inch. The normal for the date is 0.75.

As usual, the first big storm of the year meant a spike in pollution at the beaches. Spewing from storm drains around the county was all the fertilizer, antifreeze, grease and other waste that had accumulated on yards and streets throughout the summer.

County health officials issued an advisory warning people not to swim in the ocean for several days after the rains due to elevated bacteria levels.

“This would be considered the first flush,” said James Alamillo, spokesman for Heal the Bay. “Swimmers and beach-goers should definitely stay out of the water for the next three days.”

As storm drains from Point Dume to Point Fermin awoke from their summer hibernation, pools of contaminated water began forming on beaches.

“You just expect this every year,” Alamillo said. “That’s just a sad fact.”

Chad Pettera, a meteorologist with WeatherData Inc., said no rain is expected today, but skies should start clouding up again tonight, with more rain Sunday.

“It’s still a little early to tell how much rain there’ll be,” Pettera said. “But it looks as though some areas of the Los Angeles Basin will get as much as a half inch before the storm starts moving out Sunday night.”

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Times staff writer Joe Mozingo contributed to this story.