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American Morning
Several Missing After Mudslides Hit Santa Barbara
Aired December 26, 2003 - 07:04 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: For the second time in two months, the people of Santa Barbara County, California are battling a natural disaster. In October, four people were killed, nearly 1,000 homes were burned when wildfires ravaged the region. Now mudslides have swept over the same area. Several people are missing. Rescuers face treacherous conditions.
For more, we go to Miguel Marquez.
He is in Waterman Canyon in California -- Miguel, good morning.
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you there, Soledad.
This one may have come on a lot faster than those wildfires did. Between 10 and 20 people are missing, say rescuers here. That's based on interviews with the rescued. Twelve to 14 people were taken to the hospital here, among them a 13-year-old boy with bruises to his face. But even younger people were pulled out of this mud slide. Fifty-two people were also rescued from a KOA Campground just west of where we are, in a city called Devore, California. Massive, massive walls of debris coming down with all of that burned out debris from the fires.
Here's how some survivors described it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If it's water, you know, it can float away. But fire is really -- it came through here faster than I've ever seen it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was giant boulders coming down this road. It was, it was horrible. Like I said, the fire, I'd prefer the fire to this. This was terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MARQUEZ: Now, we are in the Old Waterman Canyon area just north of San Bernardino County. And this is literally ground zero for the fire that started here back in October, the old fire. Thirty homes were destroyed in this area due to those fires. About six homes are left up there. About 15 people are now trapped in those homes because the mud slides have washed out at least three bridges and roadways along the -- along Old Waterman Road up in here. And firefighters have made contact with those people. They're fine. But they can't get out because the mud is so heavy. The fire just devastated this area, leaving nothing but a blanket of ash, loose rocks, burnt out wood, huge, huge logs, as well, and all of that now was brought downhill toward these people. Firefighters concluded their search about 1:30 this morning and they expect to get started again at daybreak -- Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Well, what a tough time for the folks there.
Miguel Marquez for us this morning.
Miguel, thanks.
Earlier I spoke about the situation with Tracey Martinez.
She is the public information officer of the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.
And I asked her about details about those missing people.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TRACEY MARTINEZ, SANTA BARBARA COUNTY FIRE DEPARTMENT PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE: We believe it is, it may be a few families that were up in the area all celebrating together. They were in two buildings, two outbuildings. One outbuilding was swept away with folks in it, while the other building, there were people that were actually able to get out of the building before it swept away.
O'BRIEN: We're looking at pictures of just how bad the situation is there. One, the driving rain, and then also just the depth of the mud.
Can you give me some description of exactly what you're working with and working in?
MARTINEZ: Well, its pretty torrential terrain up there. It's pretty bad. With the heavy rain, it caused a lot of the debris just to come down with the mud, swift water, a lot of trees that were burned in the fire basically just came down on their own and just swept away by the water.
It's very cold right now, as you can probably tell, so the weather, hopefully today, will be on our side.
O'BRIEN: And how is the not so great weather so far affecting the search and rescue efforts?
MARTINEZ: Well, at about 1:30 this morning, we had to stop our rescue efforts due to the weather and safety issues. And we're hoping this morning it'll be a little bit warmer and, of course, daybreak will bring us a lot more light. We hope that we'll find a lot of these people in nearby cabins or residences or maybe they found a car to keep safe.
O'BRIEN: What are they telling you when they -- when you've been able to rescue and pull some of these people out of the muck, what did they describe to you about what they felt and what they saw?
MARTINEZ: Well, most of them said they had no warning. They couldn't hear anything. It just happened so quickly they couldn't get out. They had, some of the folks said that the mud was all the way up to their waist. We did rescue one male adult who was waist high in the mud and surrounded by trees and debris. And we had to take a chain saw and actually cut the tree away, all the debris away from him so we could get him out. He is the one that's still in the hospital.
O'BRIEN: Obviously this must have been a concern recently, in the recent past, when the fires swept through the area. I know, having lived in California for a long time, the next thing you think about is mud slides, right?
MARTINEZ: Yes. And we've put a lot of warnings out. We've done a lot of trying to let folks know, hey, you know, if you're going to be driving anywhere in the fire zones or the previous fire zones, to please be prepared.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: And that was the Santa Barbara County public information officer for the fire department.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 26, 2003 - 07:04 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: For the second time in two months, the people of Santa Barbara County, California are battling a natural disaster. In October, four people were killed, nearly 1,000 homes were burned when wildfires ravaged the region. Now mudslides have swept over the same area. Several people are missing. Rescuers face treacherous conditions.
For more, we go to Miguel Marquez.
He is in Waterman Canyon in California -- Miguel, good morning.
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you there, Soledad.
This one may have come on a lot faster than those wildfires did. Between 10 and 20 people are missing, say rescuers here. That's based on interviews with the rescued. Twelve to 14 people were taken to the hospital here, among them a 13-year-old boy with bruises to his face. But even younger people were pulled out of this mud slide. Fifty-two people were also rescued from a KOA Campground just west of where we are, in a city called Devore, California. Massive, massive walls of debris coming down with all of that burned out debris from the fires.
Here's how some survivors described it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If it's water, you know, it can float away. But fire is really -- it came through here faster than I've ever seen it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was giant boulders coming down this road. It was, it was horrible. Like I said, the fire, I'd prefer the fire to this. This was terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MARQUEZ: Now, we are in the Old Waterman Canyon area just north of San Bernardino County. And this is literally ground zero for the fire that started here back in October, the old fire. Thirty homes were destroyed in this area due to those fires. About six homes are left up there. About 15 people are now trapped in those homes because the mud slides have washed out at least three bridges and roadways along the -- along Old Waterman Road up in here. And firefighters have made contact with those people. They're fine. But they can't get out because the mud is so heavy. The fire just devastated this area, leaving nothing but a blanket of ash, loose rocks, burnt out wood, huge, huge logs, as well, and all of that now was brought downhill toward these people. Firefighters concluded their search about 1:30 this morning and they expect to get started again at daybreak -- Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Well, what a tough time for the folks there.
Miguel Marquez for us this morning.
Miguel, thanks.
Earlier I spoke about the situation with Tracey Martinez.
She is the public information officer of the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.
And I asked her about details about those missing people.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TRACEY MARTINEZ, SANTA BARBARA COUNTY FIRE DEPARTMENT PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE: We believe it is, it may be a few families that were up in the area all celebrating together. They were in two buildings, two outbuildings. One outbuilding was swept away with folks in it, while the other building, there were people that were actually able to get out of the building before it swept away.
O'BRIEN: We're looking at pictures of just how bad the situation is there. One, the driving rain, and then also just the depth of the mud.
Can you give me some description of exactly what you're working with and working in?
MARTINEZ: Well, its pretty torrential terrain up there. It's pretty bad. With the heavy rain, it caused a lot of the debris just to come down with the mud, swift water, a lot of trees that were burned in the fire basically just came down on their own and just swept away by the water.
It's very cold right now, as you can probably tell, so the weather, hopefully today, will be on our side.
O'BRIEN: And how is the not so great weather so far affecting the search and rescue efforts?
MARTINEZ: Well, at about 1:30 this morning, we had to stop our rescue efforts due to the weather and safety issues. And we're hoping this morning it'll be a little bit warmer and, of course, daybreak will bring us a lot more light. We hope that we'll find a lot of these people in nearby cabins or residences or maybe they found a car to keep safe.
O'BRIEN: What are they telling you when they -- when you've been able to rescue and pull some of these people out of the muck, what did they describe to you about what they felt and what they saw?
MARTINEZ: Well, most of them said they had no warning. They couldn't hear anything. It just happened so quickly they couldn't get out. They had, some of the folks said that the mud was all the way up to their waist. We did rescue one male adult who was waist high in the mud and surrounded by trees and debris. And we had to take a chain saw and actually cut the tree away, all the debris away from him so we could get him out. He is the one that's still in the hospital.
O'BRIEN: Obviously this must have been a concern recently, in the recent past, when the fires swept through the area. I know, having lived in California for a long time, the next thing you think about is mud slides, right?
MARTINEZ: Yes. And we've put a lot of warnings out. We've done a lot of trying to let folks know, hey, you know, if you're going to be driving anywhere in the fire zones or the previous fire zones, to please be prepared.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: And that was the Santa Barbara County public information officer for the fire department.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
