Powerful Storm Hits California, as Residents Brace for More Flooding

“Don’t let your guard down,” the National Weather Service warned.

Officials ordered residents to leave their homes in some areas, including parts of Santa Cruz County, as well as Santa Barbara County, where officials warned of flooding, mud and debris flow in parts of the burn scars left by wildfires as far back as five years ago.

That was, almost to the day, when mud and debris exposed and loosened by the raging Thomas fire was lashed by rain, causing it to slide down hillsides, engulfing homes and killing more than 20 people in Montecito.

In the agricultural town of Watsonville near Monterey Bay, southeast of Santa Cruz, Andy Gonzales, 69, was one of many under a mandatory evacuation order on Wednesday afternoon. But he said he didn’t plan to leave his home.

It had already been flooded, just a few days ago.

“New Year’s Eve was fine until the evening,” he said. Then, at about 8 p.m., the water started rising, and the sludgy waters seeped into his house. Mr. Gonzales said that elsewhere in his neighborhood, home to mostly seniors, he had seen people in canoes rescuing residents.

Since then, Mr. Gonzales has been cleaning up. As a fresh round of rain approached California on Wednesday, he helped fortify the neighborhood with sandbags as his relatives headed for a hotel.

“Everybody’s scared,” he said. “The place is like a ghost town.”

At a neighborhood in the Bay Area city of Richmond, local officials worked on Wednesday to head off a landslide. Mayor Tom Butt said that a resident had warned him on Tuesday about some scarp and rocks falling from a hill, which was saturated and visibly cracked after days of rain.