News

Local agencies hold flood risk meeting for Cranston Fire communities

Published August 28, 2018 7:45 AM

A community meeting to discuss potential flooding and debris flow in areas of the San Jacinto Mountains blackened by the Cranston was hosted in Idyllwild Tuesday night.

Various agencies, including Cal Fire, Caltrans and the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department discussed the threats of heavy rain fall. The meeting took place in the Idyllwild School gymnasium.

The Riverside County Emergency Management Department are urging people to sign up for their emergency mass communication alert system, Alert RivCo. The alerts are available via cell phone call, landline phone call, texts and emails. You can sign up for the alerts here.

Riverside County EMD have also created a map accessible for people to find out if they are in a ‘high risk’ area for debris flow. Experts say users will be prompted to type an address into a search bar and physically see where their home or business is in relation to the ‘extreme risk zones’, road closures and more.

Riverside County Sheriff’s are asking the public to evacuate the mountain as soon as a ‘Watch’ is in effect.

“It comes down the hill like a water slide. We were two miles away from the last flow. We can hear it snapping off trees, I’m telling you, these are unpredictably terrifying. Please get on the road when you get the ‘watch’,” said Luitenant Zach Hall.

Residents were also warned that the threat of destructive debris flow will remain for the next several years until new vegetation grows on mountain sides.

“This is not an issue just for this winter. When we have these burn scars, it often takes three to five years for those mountain slopes to recover. This is the worst winter. Next year will get a little better, but there will continue to be a threat,” said Jason Uhley with the Riverside County Flood Control and Water Conservation District.

The meeting was originally scheduled for Friday, Aug. 17, but was canceled due to flood warnings, which also prompted evacuations of Hurkey Creek, Apple Canyon, Fleming Ranch and Strawberry Creek, which are all communities just south of Idyllwild.

The Cranston Fire, which burned 13,139 acres in the San Bernardino National Forest, took more than two weeks to contain.

The blaze began around noon July 25 off Highway 74 in the San Jacinto Mountains between Hemet and Mountain Center, just east of the Cranston Fire Station, and destroyed about a dozen homes while prompting the evacuations of thousands of residents living in the mountain communities of Idyllwild, Mountain Center, Lake Hemet, Pine Cove and other surrounding cities.

Three firefighters were injured in the battle to knock down the fire, which drew more than 1,000 fire personnel from across the state at the height of the blaze.

A Temecula man, 32-year-old Brandon N. McGlover, allegedly set nine fires on July 25, including the one that became the Cranston blaze.

McGlover was arrested near Newport Road and State Street in Hemet about 12:30 p.m. the day the fire broke out and charged two days later with 15 felony arson counts. He has pleaded not guilty and is being held in lieu of $3.5 million bail pending a Sept. 24 felony settlement conference.