A Californian town where many rich and famous have their vacation abodes is being evacuated as continuing storms have triggered flood and mudslide warnings. The 9,000-strong town of Montecito is home to Britain's Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle and also counts Gwyneth Paltrow, Ellen DeGeneres, Katy Perry, Rob Lowe and Larry David as residents. Other celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and Jennifer Aniston also have multi-million-dollar mansions in the small community around 144 km north of Los Angeles.
Residents have received messages from the local fire department asking them to evacuate as soon as possible. The continuous rain that has battered California, which is usually in the headlines for its long droughts, has threatened to cause flooding and in the case of hilly Montecito, mudslides.
“LEAVE NOW! This is a rapidly evolving situation. Please pay close attention to emergency alerts,” a fire department alert on their website said.
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Montecito is expected to receive an additional 20 cm of rainfall in the next 24 hours. The town has already received more rainfall in the past few days than it does in an average year.
“Over the last 30 days, Montecito has received 12-20+ inches of rain across the community, exceeding our yearly average of 17 inches. This cumulative, saturating rain puts the community at greater risk of flooding and debris flow,” the Montecito Fire Department said on Twitter. Along with Montecito, Southern Californian towns of Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz have also been ordered to evacuate.
While the Golden State has been infamous over the past few years for not receiving enough rain, California has been battered by a series of successive storms that have brought a large amount of downpour which has quickly saturated the soil. US President Joe Biden issued an emergency declaration for California on Sunday in order to bring more resources for rescue and recovery efforts even as California Governor Gavin Newsom said that over 12 people have died in the past 10 days in the state.
Rescuers and emergency responders have been called in to help hundreds of stranded victims. But rising water levels and currents have made rescue operations dangerous in many cases, including the search and rescue operation for a five-year-old boy who was swept away by floodwaters.
(Edited by : Sudarsanan Mani)
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