Rain can’t keep pace with blustery North Coast wind

And they called the winds El Niño … or at least, maybe they should have.

A strong winter storm that brought morning rain, some flooding and afternoon-wind gusts of up to 70 mph to Los Angeles and Ventura counties Sunday didn’t spare the North Coast. In some areas, strong localized winds continued until 3 a.m. or later Monday.

Diablo Canyon equipment recorded a gust of 60.3 mph at 9:45 p.m. Sunday.

Rain totals reported by PG&E meteorologist John Lindsey were 0.49 of an inch just south of Cambria and 0.83 of an inch in San Simeon. Elsewhere, they ranged from 1.76 inches in the Irish Hills of San Luis Obispo to 0.25 of an inch in Nipomo.

Some large eucalyptus trees fell near the Pismo Monarch Butterfly Grove about 9:20 p.m. Sunday. Highway 1 was closed there until about 2:30 p.m. Monday so crews could clear the debris and repair the downed power lines, according to Caltrans spokesman Jim Shivers.

When another big tree fell in Los Osos, the rising root ball broke a half-inch residential gas service line and snapped electrical wires.

North Coast

County road crews estimate they responded to 15 downed-tree-related calls during a 2.5-hour period Sunday afternoon in Cambria alone.

Lindsey was in Cambria then. He said that while there are no professional-quality anemometers (wind gauges) in the area, “there’s no doubt in my mind that winds were blowing at 60 mph or so” along the North Coast.

The key word was “coast.” Just five miles inland at Bill and Shirley Bianchi’s home on San Simeon Creek Road, “the wind wasn’t blowing,” she said Monday. “A few leaves were moving on the eucalyptus tree. That’s all.”

In Cambria, the Lodge Hill neighborhood (west of Highway 1) was battered by the fierce winds, with one resident reporting having heard one tree fall every two to four minutes during the storm’s peak, another saying five trees fell on her property, and a local rancher said that 11 trees fell, with some of them blocking access to the property.

A large pine fell on a Mazda parked next door on Dreydon Avenue. An oak-tree branch braced another falling pine, preventing it doing serious damage to a home on Alban Place.

Cambria resident Michele Sherman wrote on Facebook on Sunday night: “I think one of the horses from across the way just flew by my window. Either that or it was the neighbor’s car. It’s a bit breezy out there.”

According to PG&E stats, a maximum of 380 people were without electrical service in Cambria during the storm, with line crews already positioned in town in anticipation of the high winds.

But there was action farther up the coast, too. Linda McDonald said she was watching the sunset from the top of Exotic Gardens Drive, right off Highway 1, when a large cypress fell across the driveway. She was blocked there until four county road crews arrived to cut an opening.

Another falling tree fell across lines on Pico Avenue in San Simeon at 6:37 p.m., cutting power to 35 accounts. Electricity was restored there about 2:30 a.m. Monday.

This story was originally published February 3, 2016 at 11:06 AM with the headline "Rain can’t keep pace with blustery North Coast wind."