BORREGO SPRINGS — Dozens of homes were damaged in Borrego Springs over the weekend after a heavy storm dropped several inches of rain, drenching the area and causing flooding and rock slides, officials said Monday.
Most of the damage happened in the De Anza Desert Country Club neighborhood, in northern Borrego Springs, where the waterline reached as high as two feet above ground, sheriff’s Deputy Pat Morrissey said.
“There’s probably more than 40 homes damaged,” Morrissey said.
Mot of the damage occurred to homes on Montezuma Road and De Anza Drive, surrounding the 15th fairway of the club’s course, although debris littered much of the development. A small part of Lazy S Road was still under water Monday evening.
“There’s mud in many homes,” Morrissey said. Backyard swimming pools were also filled to the brim with muddy runoff after a torrential downpour Sunday over Indian Head Peak sent water flowing into the town, Morrissey said.
The storm flooded roadways and left mud and rocks littering the streets.
Montezuma Valley Road from Ranchita to Borrego Springs was shut down and will remain closed until further notice due to boulders in the roadway and the threat of more rock slides, authorities said. Sections of Borrego Valley Road and Borrego Springs Road were temporarily closed, but both roads had reopened by Monday afternoon.
Most of the homes in De Anza are unoccupied this time of year — August in Borrego can be brutal — but residents Jim Bennett and Cathy Gay were home Sunday on De Anza Drive. It had been raining much of the day, really hard in the afternoon.
A golf tournament had just ended on television about 3:30 p.m. when the couple heard a strange noise.
“We. looked out and there was a two-foot wall of water charging into our house and into the windows,” Bennett said. “It was like a river was going around the house and across the road and into the fairway.”
Brick walls surrounding the backyard of the home and a neighbor’s home broke apart. Bennett’s patio furniture and much of his landscaping was washed away. He still hasn’t found a couple chairs.
“It could have been much worse,” Bennett said. The windows didn’t break. Instead a few inches of mud seeped into his house.
“It’s another interesting life experience,” he said.
Handyman Jim Zuehl, a 22-year resident of Borrego Springs, was going from house to house of various clients Monday morning examining the damage and then calling owners with the bad news.
“It’s pretty much devastation, a lot of destruction,” Zuehl said.
“There are a lot of poor families whose houses have been inundated by flash floodwaters.”
He’s seen flash flooding before, most recently in 2004 when he said water got as high as six feet compared to the two this time around.
“This is part of Borrego. This is part of living in the desert,” he said.
“This desert was carved by wind and water, so we don’t like this, but we expect it. This is part of desert living, unfortunately.”
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| Anza-Borrego Desert State Park Campsite |
Here's a great link to information about weather (and flash flooding!) in the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park area: http://www.abdnha.org/borrego-springs-weather.htm
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