Santa Rosa saw persistent rain all day Wednesday, leading to some localized flooding and road closures, plus flood warnings and flood warnings.
Although no serious flooding is expected with this stormThere are still many dangers for motorists.
“The curbs and gutters can handle the water, but they have nowhere to go because they’re trying to flow into the creeks, but when the creeks are up, that water has nowhere to really flow into, so there’s a lot of backups as a result” , said Paul Lowenthal of the Santa Rosa Fire Department.
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He said their department works closely with Public Works to remove debris from creeks and streams, as well as storm drains to keep the water moving. If not, the city will see the kind of minor flooding that occurred on West College Avenue early Wednesday afternoon.
On Industrial Avenue, many motorists simply ignored the “Road Closed” signs and drove through the flooded street. Lowenthal said this type of behavior is very dangerous during these types of storms.
“We see time and time again that people do not heed these warnings and try to continue driving and end up stranded or, in the worst case, needing to be physically rescued because they are in moving water. That provokes a significant response to an incident that was 100% avoidable,” Lowenthal said.
Across town, at Cartunes in Santa Rosa, it was a different kind of emergency: A car drove through their store Tuesday afternoon, just before it started to rain.
“My heart was pounding, I was shaking,” Nicole Meza said.
She is the daughter of the owner and worked behind the counter at the time.
“I think I heard something a moment before and then I saw it come in and I didn’t realize for a moment what had happened,” she said.
Nicole and the customer were not seriously injured. Neither did the driver, who, according to police, simply lost control of his vehicle. It did pose a problem in closing the gaping hole before it rained, because water and electronics don’t mix well.
“That’s a huge fear because they’re all passed on together. Who knows what would happen, but that would be a huge problem that we have to solve,” Meza said.
Just two weeks ago, Santa Rosa was issued a red flag warning due to fire danger. This storm allowed the city of Santa Rosa to officially declare the end of fire season on Monday.
Katie Nielsen
