Sacramento County officials explain what happens if roads flood

Three people died in Sacramento County following dangerous flooding caused by a winter storm that swept through Northern California on New Year’s Eve.Highway 99 and surrounding streets, such as Dillard Road, were submerged, along with several cars that got stuck in the floodwaters. Emergency crews had to perform rescue operations to get people safely out of their vehicles. Sacramento County responds to Dillard Road flooding The whole situation is prompting a big question for many, including those who were stuck on Dillard Road: Were cars able to get onto Dillard Road because it was not blocked correctly? KCRA 3 asked Sacramento County officials for an answer.”Dillard Road was closed ahead of the major flooding because we know that that was a likely imminent result, what that it would end up flooded,” Sacramento County spokesperson Janna Haynes said.Haynes said the Sacramento County Department of Transportation handles all the roads in the unincorporated part of the county, which includes Dillard Road. Haynes told KCRA 3 that two signs, one that said, “flooded” and another that said, “road closed,” were placed in the middle of Dillard Road around 4 pm Saturday. Those signs had bright colors and reflective tape, so Haynes said the closure should have been obvious. Haynes also said that crews do not fully barricade roads for safety reasons. But that leads to another question: If cars were able to navigate around the closure signs, why was there no one there to stop them? “Unfortunately, we don’t have the resources to literally post a person for traffic control at every single one of these road closures,” Haynes said in response. “Because we can’t necessarily have a physical presence at each one of these road closures, just because there were so many, unless it’s reported to us that people are driving around the barriers of that somehow the barriers were moved, we may not know until we can get back to that location.”Caltrans and California Highway Patrol respond to Highway 99 floodingCaltrans was in charge of handling the Highway 99 closure, which officials told KCRA 3 happened just after midnight on New Year’s Day because they did not expect such a large volume of water to spill onto the roadway.” Mother nature kind of caught us by surprise there with the amount of water that got through there in such a quick amount of time, and so we didn’t have staffing there that we have now ,” Caltrans spokesperson Steve Nelson said. Mark Leavitt, a spokesperson for the California Highway Patrol, said CHP officers responded first to the Highway 99 flooding after people called in to report it. Leavitt said dispatch was notified, who then reached out to Caltrans.”The river, it rose so quickly. It rose really fast that there came a point where it became impassible, and so, shut the road down themselves and waited for Caltrans to arrive on scene to put in a road closure,” Leavitt said.Leavitt added that once Caltrans is in place for Road closures, as they were on Highway 99, CHP focuses on directing traffic. He said CHP stayed at the Highway 99 on-and-offramps to keep vehicles from entering. But with cars seen on New Year’s Day submerged on the roadway, that raises the question of how they got through. Leavitt said due to a large amount of flooding, New Year’s Eve maximum enforcement and other calls, “it was pretty much impossible to man each closure.”Looking ahead to upcoming storm systemsMore wet weather is forecast this weekend and on Monday. County officials, first responders and law enforcement agencies told KCRA 3 they are working to ramp up their resources. “Something that we’re certainly looking at as we come near to these next set of storms is how we can effectively manage to keep people safe,” Haynes said. “We’ve put in quite a few resource requests over the duration of this even just because it is going longer, and we’re going to have three of four storm fronts move through here.”The Sacramento Metropolitan Fire Department said it currently has extra resources and will keep them onboard through the weekend. Air operations program manager and pilot Bryce Mitchell told KCRA 3 the agency’s UH1 Huey helicopters have already done nearly a dozen rescues this week. Normally, the helicopters are manned by a three-person team. But Mitchell said there are extra hands available to help because of the state of emergency in effect.”Due to the extreme conditions of clouds and low visibility that it brings, we’ve created a position where we’ve put two pilots into the aircraft and we’ve had an additional rescuer on hand, so we’ve been staffed with up to five people on the aircraft,” Leavitt said.

Three people died in Sacramento County following dangerous flooding caused by a winter storm that swept through Northern California on New Year’s Eve.

Highway 99 and surrounding streets, such as Dillard Road, were submerged, along with several cars that got stuck in the floodwaters. Emergency crews had to perform rescue operations to get people safely out of their vehicles.

Sacramento County responds to Dillard Road flooding

The whole situation is prompting a big question for many, including those who were stuck on Dillard Road: Were cars able to get onto Dillard Road because it was not blocked correctly? KCRA 3 asked Sacramento County officials for an answer.

“Dillard Road was closed ahead of the major flooding because we know that that was a likely imminent result, what that it would end up flooded,” Sacramento County spokesperson Janna Haynes said.

Haynes said the Sacramento County Department of Transportation handles all the roads in the unincorporated part of the county, which includes Dillard Road. Haynes told KCRA 3 that two signs, one that said, “flooded” and another that said, “road closed,” were placed in the middle of Dillard Road around 4 pm Saturday.

Those signs had bright colors and reflective tape, so Haynes said the closure should have been obvious. Haynes also said that crews do not fully barricade roads for safety reasons. But that leads to another question: If cars were able to navigate around the closure signs, why was there no one there to stop them?

“Unfortunately, we don’t have the resources to literally post a person for traffic control at every single one of these road closures,” Haynes said in response. “Because we can’t necessarily have a physical presence at each one of these road closures, just because there were so many, unless it’s reported to us that people are driving around the barriers of that somehow the barriers were moved, we may not know until we can get back to that location.”

Caltrans and California Highway Patrol respond to Highway 99 flooding

Caltrans was in charge of handling the Highway 99 closure, which officials told KCRA 3 happened just after midnight on New Year’s Day because they did not expect such a large volume of water to spill onto the roadway.

“Mother nature kind of caught us by surprise there with the amount of water that got through there in such a quick amount of time, and so we didn’t have staffing there that we have now,” Caltrans spokesperson Steve Nelson said.

Mark Leavitt, a spokesperson for the California Highway Patrol, said CHP officers responded first to the Highway 99 flooding after people called in to report it. Leavitt said dispatch was notified, who then reached out to Caltrans.

“The river, it rose so quickly. It rose really fast that there came a point where it became impassible, and so, [responding CHP officers] shut the road down themselves and waited for Caltrans to arrive on scene to put in a road closure,” Leavitt said.

Leavitt added that once Caltrans is in place for road closures, as they were on Highway 99, CHP focuses on directing traffic. He said CHP stayed at the Highway 99 on-and-offramps to keep vehicles from entering. But with cars seen on New Year’s Day submerged on the roadway, that raises the question of how they got through. Leavitt said due to a large amount of flooding, New Year’s Eve maximum enforcement and other calls, “it was pretty much impossible to man each closure.”

Looking ahead to upcoming storm systems

More wet weather is forecast this weekend and on Monday. County officials, first responders and law enforcement agencies told KCRA 3 they are working to ramp up their resources.

“Something that we’re certainly looking at as we come near to these next set of storms is how we can effectively manage to keep people safe,” Haynes said. “We’ve put in quite a few resource requests over the duration of this even just because it is going longer, and we’re going to have three of four storm fronts move through here.”

The Sacramento Metropolitan Fire Department said it currently has extra resources and will keep them onboard through the weekend. Air operations program manager and pilot Bryce Mitchell told KCRA 3 the agency’s UH1 Huey helicopters have already done nearly a dozen rescues this week. Normally, the helicopters are manned by a three-person team. But Mitchell said there are extra hands available to help because of the state of emergency in effect.

“Due to the extreme conditions of clouds and low visibility that it brings, we’ve created a position where we’ve put two pilots into the aircraft and we’ve had an additional rescuer on hand, so we’ve been staffed with up to five people on the aircraft,” Leavitt said.

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