| Gosh, what a sweet, sweet sound that broke our sleep early Tuesday. The rain returned to Southern California. And, damn, it sounded good — signaling the true end of the summer and the march on to winter and a new year. |
| My pre-sunrise reverie didn't last long, though. "Powerful atmospheric river storm pounds L.A. with flooding" warned the first morning headline of my digital news diet. On TV, a red banner headline, across the top of every channel, ratcheted up the alarm: "SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING!!!!" My brain (not the National Weather Service) added the exclamation points. |
| But the weather outside our San Gabriel Valley home hardly could have seemed more benign: a solid and steady rain and mild breezes. This atmospheric river felt more like a babbling brook. I remembered the words of the Midwesterner I'd interviewed Monday, who sneered at the way Southern Californians flinch at every garden-variety storm. Don't get me started about how SoCal motorists change their driving habits during inclement weather. |
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| A bicyclist and passing storm clouds are reflected in a pool of water, remnants of an early-hour downpour in Santa Monica on Tuesday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) |
| I concede I've been a bit of a delicate flower on the weather front, preferring to wear shorts and sandals year-around. And yet, those memories. Of the time a rain-loosened hillside in Malibu collapsed, closing Pacific Coast Highway for months. And the time in 2017, much worse, when floods tore through Montecito, killing 23 people and destroying 130 homes. |
| Even knowing the potential for death and destruction were real, there still was something comically out of proportion about the young TV reporter being pelted by rain while reporting late Tuesday morning from Sierra Madre. He reeled off the long list of evacuations, warnings and cautions that officials hadissued. But beside him, his camera aimed at a concrete flood channel that told a different story, as it easily accommodated a downpour that fell several magnitudes short of a "torrent." |
| This is not to say we didn't get a nice dousing. Much of Ventura and Los Angeles counties got 1.5 to 2 inches of rain. Some neighborhoods got a lot more. Even before the rain petered out Tuesday afternoon, several points in the San Gabriel Mountains had absorbed more than 5 inches. More than an inch an hour pelted Cogswell Reservoir in those mountains. |
| We'd been forewarned for at least a day to take precautions: Don't drive places you don't have to, sandbag vulnerable driveways, yards and structures. Don't venture into flooded intersections. Residents and business owners in Altadena and Pacific Palisades understandably worried that they would have to endure mudslides and flooding, just nine months after much of those communities burned to the ground. |
| L.A. Mayor Karen Bass — no doubt exhausted by hearing she didn't do enough to prepare for the January firestorm that leveled much of Pacific Palisades — was out in front of this week's storm. An announcement Monday afternoon detailed the multiple precautions the city had taken, including the bolstering of hillsides against sliding; the city Emergency Operations Center activated for possible action and the public works and fire equipment standing ready for action. |
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| Workers clear rocks that fell onto Pacific Coast Highway during a morning downpour in Malibu on Tuesday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) |
| "The City is prepared and we are ready to respond during this storm," Bass said in a statement, before making an impromptu visit Monday night to the Palisades. "This is out of an abundance of caution," the mayor said. " We are hoping that the system will not be as bad. ... But of course, we want to be extremely prepared." |
| Intricacies of the unusual early-season storm system caused the National Weather Service to issue its first severe thunderstorm watch for the region in 18 years. That's one level short of the warning that occurs when more dangerous conditions emerge. By sundown Tuesday, the thunderstorm watch had gone away and the city of L.A. had lifted evacuation orders and warnings. |
| Despite growing up in the Midwest, where severe weather is much more common, Weather Service meteorologist Lisa Phillips said Southern Californians need not apologize for their worries. "With some of the geomorphology we get here and soil that's not that stable, it's crazy to see what the weather can do out here," Phillips said. "It should not be downplayed." |
Today's top stories |
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| The United Nurses Assns. of California and Union of Health Care Professionals strike outside Downey Kaiser Permanente during a rainy Tuesday. (William Liang/For The Times) |
Tens of thousands of Kaiser Permanente healthcare workers launch a five-day strike |
- Up to 31,000 Kaiser Permanente healthcare workers in California and Hawaii walked off the job Tuesday in a five-day strike over wages and staffing.
- Workers seek a 25% salary increase over four years to keep pace with inflation; Kaiser offered 21.5% and hired 7,600 temporary replacements.
- The union says short staffing leads to burnout; Kaiser insists that wages, not staffing, are the core issue driving the strike.
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Virtually all news outlets reject a restrictive Pentagon press policy |
- The new policy from the Defense Department that equates basic reporting methods to criminal activity has prompted a revolt among Pentagon journalists that could leave the nation's largest agency and the world's largest military without a press corps.
- It would force journalists and media organizations to refrain from publishing any material that is not approved by the military — a clear violation of 1st Amendment protections to free speech, lawyers for media outlets said.
- Only one outlet — the far-right One America News, or OAN — said it would agree to the new policy.
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Newsom vetoes a bill that would have granted priority college admission for descendants of slavery |
- The legislation would not have required applicants to belong to any particular race or ethnicity — a crucial detail that proponents said distinguished it from affirmative action, which is banned at California colleges.
- Critics, however, argued the term "slave" was used as a proxy for race.
- Legal experts told The Times last month that the measure probably would face challenges in court if the governor signed it into law.
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More big stories |
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Commentary and opinions |
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This morning's must read |
| | | Local fire crews are launching a sweeping effort to prevent future wildfires in the Santa Monica Mountains. It entails using both animals and machines to create fire breaks — a controversial solution in Southern California. | | | |
Other great reads |
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| Keep up with California | Your support helps us deliver the news that matters most. Subscribe to the Los Angeles Times. | | | | | |
For your downtime |
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| Guests will play as detectives or medical examiners in Appleseed Avenue's "Election Day." (Juliana Yamada/Los Angeles Times) |
Going out |
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Staying in |
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A question for you: What frustrates you the most about parking in L.A.? |
| John writes: "The idiotic fad of backing into parking spaces." |
| Michael writes: "My parking frustration is aimed at restaurant/club Valet Parking. We have experienced Valet Parking that took local street parking, that we paid for with our taxes, and turned it into paid restaurant parking. The only barrier is that the Valet Parking company pay a fee to the City for use in a designated Valet Park Zone, which the City does not regulate well." |
| Email us at essentialcalifornia@latimes.com, and your response might appear in the newsletter this week. |
And finally ... the photo of the day |
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| Members of a running club cross the 6th Street Bridge. The viaduct was the city's most expensive bridge project to date, costing an estimated $588 million. (Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times) |
| Today's great photo is from Times photographer Jason Armond at the 6th Street Bridge in downtown L.A. The L.A. landmark was once hailed as a "ribbon of light." Now, scrap metal thieves have made it dark and invisible. |
| Have a great day, from the Essential California team |
| Jim Rainey, staff reporter
Hugo Martín, assistant editor, fast break desk
Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor
Andrew Campa, staff writer
Karim Doumar, head of newsletters |
| How can we make this newsletter more useful? Send comments to essentialcalifornia@latimes.com. |
