Flood and mudslide risk for storm-battered California
Traffic struggled through floodwater on the Long Beach Freeway (Getty Images)
A series of powerful Pacific storms have pounded California with torrential rain and snow this week, forcing hundreds of homes to be evacuated below wildfire-scarred mountains.
Flash flooding has brought severe disruption to transport in Los Angeles and San Diego and high winds, including a waterspout, damaged buildings and brought six metre (20 feet) waves crashing in along the coastline.
Officials issued another flash flood watch and thunderstorm warning for much of southern California with as much as 76mm (3 inches) of rain expected by Friday.
Authorities ordered the evacuation of nearly 800 homes in the foothills near Los Angeles on Wednesday, fearing that the strongest storms to hit southern California in years would spark mudslides.
The threatened homes lie in suburbs north of Los Angeles, nestled against steep hillsides and canyons left barren by a massive wildfire last summer and saturated by heavy rain over the past three days.
The intense weather has also knocked out power to thousands and unleashed lightning strikes on two airliners at Burbank's Bob Hope Airport.
According to the United States' National Weather Service, the storms, which began battering Southern California on Sunday, are the heaviest to strike the region since 2005.
More heavy rain is expected to batter the same areas throughout Thursday and Friday.
