Post Tropical Storm Hilary: Death Valley gets one year’s rain in a day as new flood warnings issued

In a dramatic scene, rescue officials in the desert community of Cathedral City, near Palm Springs, drove a bulldozer through mud to a swamped care home and rescued 14 residents by scooping them up and carrying them to safety, fire chief Michael Contreras said.

They were among 46 rescues the city performed between late on Sunday night and the next afternoon from mud and water standing up to 5 feet (1.5 metres.)

“We were able to put the patients into the scoop. It’s not something that I’ve ever done in my 34 years as a firefighter, but disasters like this really cause us to have to look at those means of rescue that aren’t in the book and that we don’t do everyday,” he said at a news conference.

Tropical Storm Hilary drenched Palm Springs with over half of a year’s worth of rain in mere hours – and cut off the city’s emergency services.

California officials declared a local state of emergency due to “unprecedented rainfall and flooding of local roadways and at least one swift water rescue.” City officials also urged residents to stay home and to “avoid driving during these dangerous conditions.”

Dozens of cars are trapped in floodwaters across the city as well as in surrounding communities, according to ABC7.

“There’s no way in or out of Palm Springs and that’s the case for the majority of the Coachella Valley. We’re all stuck. Our major freeway, I-10, is also closed in both directions. This is a very extreme situation at the moment,” said Palm Springs Mayor Grace Garner on Monday.

Hilary, the first tropical storm to hit Southern California in 84 years, flooded roads, toppled trees and forced a rescue by bulldozer of more than a dozen older residents trapped by mud in a care home on Monday as it now marches northward, prompting flood watches and warnings in half a dozen states.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Hilary had lost much of its steam and only vestiges of the storm were heading over the Rocky Mountains, but it warned that “continued life-threatening and locally catastrophic flooding” was expected over portions of the southwestern US, following record-breaking rainfall.

Forecasters said the threat for flooding in states farther north was highest across much of southeastern Oregon into the west-central mountains of Idaho, with potential thunderstorms and localised torrential rains on Tuesday.

Footage shows the muddy torrents sweeping away rocks between State Route 2 and Sheep Creek on 20 August.

Drivers were advised to stay off SR-2 also known as the Angeles Crest Highway, in the Angeles National Forest as any trace of the road was no longer visible.

Millions of Americans were under flood and high-wind warnings as the storm moved north, unleashing heavy rains from the California-Mexico border to Las Vegas and beyond.

A British expat living in Los Angeles has said Storm Hilary turned the street outside his house into a “river” which you could have “canoed down”, describing the tempest and concurrent earthquake as “biblical”.

Tim Amoui, originally from Haslemere in Surrey, and his American partner Shayda Frost, 37, “battened down the hatches” after receiving Government emergency alerts to his phone advising “flood warning, danger to life” on Sunday.

The 34-year-old businessman said the situation deteriorated rapidly and became “more apocalyptic” overnight on Sunday when the Californian city was struck by a 5.1 magnitude earthquake.

Footage shows cars driving through floods after Tropical Storm Hilary hit California.

The video, posted to Snapchat, shows cars navigating floodwater after torrential rains in the city of Coachella.

Millions of Americans were under flood and high-wind warnings as the storm moved north, unleashing heavy rains from the California-Mexico border to Las Vegas and beyond.

The Palm Springs Police Department said in a statement Sunday that 911 lines were down and that in the event of an emergency, residents should text 911 or reach out to the nearest police or fire station.

As skies were clearing Monday in California, the National Weather Service warned of flooding underway in the Mount Charleston area west of Las Vegas. Forecasters said the threat for flooding in states farther north on Monday was highest across much of southeastern Oregon into the west-central mountains of Idaho “with record breaking precipitation” forecast for Monday morning.

Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center, meanwhile, were watching a disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico that now has an 80% chance of developing into a tropical disturbance or tropical storm before reaching the western Gulf coastline on Tuesday. Forecasters urged people along the coast in northern Mexico and Texas to monitor the system, adding that tropical storm watches or warnings may be issued later Monday.