Several days of heavy rain eroded the ground at a local RV park near Santa Clarita, sending several motorhomes and other vehicles into rushing river waters below and prompting several others to be evacuated.
“You would never imagine that this would happen,” resident Natalie Fitzgibbons told KTLA. “You think that the water is flowing fine in the river … why would it take out three layers of homes? It’s crazy.”
While power has since been restored, residents at Valencia Travel Village were without electricity for days.
Saturday is when the hillside started to collapse at the mobile home village and RVs began dropping into the river.
Fortunately, many had already evacuated, and no one was hurt. The storm, though, brought down electrical wires and collapsed pipes, leaving some residents without water and power.
“Basically, we are saturated between the last storm and this storm,” said resident Ray Fortman. “Basically, at this point, everything is seeping in, which is true for a lot of our neighbors as well. It’s just hard to keep back this much rain. It just keeps coming.”
Two motor homes, along with cars, golf carts and outdoor furniture disappeared into the river.
Roads in the park have also washed away and a large area is cordoned off with caution tape as crews work to restore water service.
Later in the afternoon, trucks carrying generators arrived to help get the power back on, but what many of the residents want are their homes back. Some of them are ready to go search for their belongings, but with more rain still hitting the region, it’s still not safe.
“They want to go keep looking, but the water is running too much. You can’t recover anything. I think it’s not going to happen,” Fitzgibbons said. “I think it’s maybe not going to happen until Thursday if the rain stops.”
Crews are currently working to restore water and work on the plumbing, but say it may be days before the water service is returned.