Rescue expands as California mudslides kill at least 15
Officials say some 25 people were injured and at least 50 others had to be rescued by helicopters. Authorities are warning that the death toll is expected to rise.
A search and rescue team walks into an area of debris and mud flow due to heavy rain in Montecito, California, on January 9, 2018.
At least 15 people were killed and homes were swept from their foundations on Tuesday as heavy rain sent mud and boulders sliding down hills stripped of vegetation by southern California's recent wildfires.
Officials said at least 25 were injured and at least 50 had to be rescued by helicopters.
Rescue crews used helicopters to lift people to safety because of blocked roads, and firefighters slogged through waist-high mud to pull a muck-covered 14-year-old girl out of the ruins of a home in Montecito, northwest of Los Angeles, where she had been trapped for hours.
She was taken away on a stretcher.
"The best way I can describe it is, it looked like a World War One battlefield," Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said.
TRT World's Adefemi Akinsanya has more.
Massive damage
Several houses were destroyed, and residents were unaccounted for in neighborhoods hard to reach because of downed trees and power lines, he said.
The mud was reported to be up to 1.5 metres deep in places.
"We're performing multiple rescues. There will be more," said Santa Barbara County Fire Department Captain Dave Zaniboni, adding that some of those brought to safety were buried in mud.
There was a backlog of scores of callers requesting help.
Sally Brooks said a "boulder slide" occurred outside her home in nearby Carpinteria in the dead of night.
"We were laying in bed listening to the rain, and out of nowhere our bed just started shaking, and we could hear just this, like, thunder," she told KTLA-TV.
Emergency personnel search through debris and mud flow after a mudslide in Montecito, California, US in this still photo taken from video provided by the Santa Barbara County Fire Department, January 9, 2018.
Widespread devastation
Photos posted on social media showed upside-down cars along debris-clogged roads and mud waist-deep in living rooms.
Forecasters said the maximum rainfall occurred in a 15-minute span starting at 1130 GMT near the Montecito, Summerland and Carpinteria areas of Santa Barbara County.
Montecito got more than a 12.7 millimetres in five minutes, while Carpinteria received 21.84 millimetres in 15 minutes.
Crews worked to clear debris from roads across the Los Angeles metropolitan area, including a key stretch of US 101 that was brought to a standstill along the border of Santa Barbara and Ventura counties.
Nearly 48 kilometres of the highway were shut down at point.
The storm walloped much of the state with damaging winds and thunderstorms.
Downtown San Francisco got a record 80 millimetres of rain on Monday, smashing the old mark of 59.94 millimetres set in 1872.
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