A8|Wednesday,January 11, 2017| SFChronicle.com XXXXX•
FROM THE COVER
County alsowere inundated,
withflood alarms andevacu-
ations ordered briefly in San
Anselmo.
Forecasters said theRus-
sian River at Guernevillewas
expected to hit 38.4 feetWed-
nesday night, more than 6
feet above flood stag e. That
would send the river to its
highest level since theNew
Year’s Day flood of 2006,
when thewater level hit 44.
feet andflooded roads, re-
sorts and rental cabins.The
record height for the river
was 49 .7 feet on Dec. 23,1955.
By Tuesday night, volun-
tary evacuation orderswere
put into place for people liv-
ing along the river’s swollen
banks.
Earlier Tuesday, the river
gushed into residential areas.
Neighbors were helping
neighbors by fetching medi-
cine, using makeshift safety
lines to pullstuck cars out of
harm’s way and providing
rides in rowboats and canoes.
“It’s gonna get worse,”
decl aredMike Collins, 34,
who managed to get his truck
across a lake that had formed
on Neely Road and was help-
ing otherswhose homeswere
isolatedby the floodwaters.
Collins,who has missed
two days of work trying to
avert disaster, helped several
people cross the highwater
Tuesday. By nightfall, he said,
it would be impossible to ford
the muddy waters, and any-
one on the other sidewould
be marooned.
“I’ve dealt with this before,
so I’m helpingmy neighbors,”
Collins said after crossing the
floodwaters in his pickup
truck one last time toget
medication left behindby a
couplewhose sonsuffered
from seizures. “It’s something
you’ve got to take asit comes
and just battle throughit.”
Frank Walter was using a
200-foot line to pull cars
across thewater covering
Neely and DrakeRoad, just
across Highway 116.
“There are a lot of people
stuck back there,” he said,
pointingacross to homes on
Neely. “Peopleget desperate
and try to drive through the
water andget stuck. My
house isstarting toflood, so
it’s going to affect me tonight.
All you cando is makesure
you ha ve provisions and ride
the storm out.”
The lo w-lying areasweren’t
the only places inGuerneville
harmedby the storm. A
mudslide cascaded through
redwoods and between two
houses on asteep hillside on
SantaRosa Avenue onMon-
day, forcing county officials to
red-tag the homes.The entire
street, off DuncanRoad and
Old Monte RioRoad, was a
watery quag mire, withmud,
branches anddebris covering
the road.
As is standardwhen the
Russian River floods, thePlay
LandPee Wee Golf & Arcade
was in the middle of a large
brown lake ofwater. The
miniaturegolf course features
a purple dinosaur, redmush-
room, green alligator and a
happywhale jutting out as if
on a jauntyswim. A sign
stood in the middle of the
water, needlessly informing
visitors that the placewas
closed.
For the next two days, the
NationalWeather Service has
issued no fewer than five
kinds of cautions for theRus-
sian River area — aflood
warning, a coastalflood ad-
visory, a windadvisory, a
flash flood watch and a haz-
ardous-weather outlook.
Things are expected to dry
out Thursday andFriday and
into theweekend, with the
sun expected to poke through
the clouds.But before that
Leah Millis /The Chronicle
Nathan Quarles of Sonoma County’s resource managementagency inspects amudslide on SantaRosa Avenuethat forc ed the red-tagging oftwo homes.
Fresh storm smacks region
Storm from page A
JeremyPortje /Specialto The Chronicle
Samuel Sanchezgets hisdog to safety af ter loadingsupplies into a canoe onthe floodedstreets
of Guerneville.Residents ofthe Russian River area hadto change modes of transportation.
Storm continues on A
“High winds will
likely bring a lot more
treesdown.”
Steve Anderson, meteorologist with
the Weather Service
at UCSan Diego’s Scripps
Inst itution of Oceanography.
“In the south, not somuch.”
This weekend, somuch
water fell from thesky thatat
one point nearly 63million
gallons ofwater per minute
poured into theFolsomReser-
voir near Sacramento, leaving
dam operatorsat the long-dry
basin opening thefloodgates in
an exercise that has occurred
just a few times in the past five
years.
The story was similaracross
the state. California’s 154 major
reservoirs on Tuesday held
whatthey typicallydo after
January, normally thewettest
month.
At Don Pedro Reservoir
outsideYosemite,which San
Franciscoshares with irriga-
tion districts inModest o and
Turlock and serves as the
largest st orage site for the city
and its southernsuburbs, the
Bay Area holdings reached
capacity.
“This is a bigdeal,” said
CharlesSheehan, a spokesman
for the SanFrancisco Public
Utilities Commission, noting
that theagency now hasat
least five ye ars’ worth ofsup-
plies forits 2.6 million custom-
ers. “Wewere very nervous. It
was three or four dryyears in
a ro w, and ourwater bankwas
getting lower and lower.”
The greatly improved re-
serves are the result of an
atmospheric river — essential-
ly massive channels ofstorm
clouds that provideup to 50
percent of thestate’ s water —
that struck California in the
New Year afterawet fall.
In just aweek, the Big Sur
coastgot nearly 15 inches of
rain,about a third ofwhat it
normally sees in ayear, while
parts of the Sierragot close to
a foot,according to theNation-
al Weather Service.
‘Drought is over,’ at least in state’ s far northern part
San
Francisco
Northern
Sierra
precipitation
stations
Sacramento River
hydrologic region
Current year
Water year (Oct.1toSept. 30)
OCT DEC JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP
Current year
OCT DEC JAN
100 inches
80
60
40
20
0
Cumulative precipitation
NorthernSierra,forselectedwateryears
Cumulative precipitation
NorthernSierra,forselectedwateryears
AVERAGE
(1922through 1998)
AVERAGE
(1922through 1998)
1982-83 (wettest)1982-83 (wettest)
1997-981997-
2015-162015-
2014-152014-
1976-77 (second driest)1976-77 (second driest)
ToddTrumbull/TheChronicle
Precipitation
totals
measuredat
thestate’s
eightrecord-
ingstationsin
thenorthern
Sierraareon
trackto
matchorbeat
someofthe
wettestyears
onrecord.
Awet
start to
the year
Source: California Department of Water Resources
Drough tfrom page A
Drough tcontinues on A