Flooding and Mudslides Shut Down Roads Across Los Angeles

As cities further north along the California coast face mandatory evacuations, Los Angeles also continues to be impacted by flooding due to heavy rainfall across the state. Reportedly, as of Tuesday morning, Jan. 10, Porter Ranch and Woodland Hills have gotten six inches of precipitation, Bel Air and Beverly Hills have gotten five, and the Hollywood Reservoir has gotten over five inches in 24 hours. As a result, Southern California is overflowing with flood advisories, high wind and surf warnings, and significant road closures.

Five miles of Mulholland Drive are closed for repairs due to weeks of compounded rain and subsequent flooding; this resulted in a mudslide on Monday, Jan. 9, just above the celebrity-loved, gated Beverly Ridge Estates community. As reported by LA Magazine, safety crews are also monitoring unsettled earth near Laurel Canyon Boulevard (which was preemptively fortified with concrete barriers just last week).

Stretches of the 101 Freeway are closed between Carpinteria and Santa Barbara; a mudslide and large boulder have blocked off a section of Malibu Canyon Road; roads in the Sepulveda Basin are flooded; northbound lanes on the 5 Freeway have been closed at Lankershim Boulevard; and mudslides — coupled with fallen trees — have compelled the closure of Topanga Canyon Road between Pacific Coast Highway and Mulholland Highway.

pic.twitter.com/TEyeJHmK6Z

— Caltrans District 5 (@CaltransD5) January 10, 2023

In Los Angeles, vehicles have been found in a road’s sinkhole — just one impact of extreme storm weather that has already claimed the lives of 16 people across California.

In a news conference over the weekend, Governor Gavin Newsom said: “These floods are deadly and have now turned to be more deadly than even the wildfires here in the state of California.” Even the notoriously dry Los Angeles River basin has become a full-fledged river over the past 48 hours.

The #LARain has the LA river on beast mode! pic.twitter.com/tJL7U5w1fV

— Jonathan Evans ⭐️ (@evansatlaw) January 5, 2023

According to the National Weather Service of Los Angeles’s official Twitter account, a flood advisory for the city is in effect this afternoon “for urban and small stream flooding.” The heaviest rain is currently clocking in at one inch per hour around the San Gabriel Mountains, the area that was scorched by the Bobcat Fire in September 2020. More rainfall is expected as the state’s atmospheric river forecast — rivers of water vapor in the sky pushed along by strong, hurricane-quick winds — persists.