Major canyon roads were closed for several hours on Saturday. Also, a landslide takes out part of another road.
By Olivia Damavandi / Assistant Editor
A huge landslide wiped out 100 feet of road on Rambla Pacifico last week Friday, while wet weather wreaked havoc on major Malibu roadways during the weekend.
The official cause of the Rambla Pacifico landslide is currently under investigation. John Kelly, deputy director of Los Angeles County Department of Public Works, on Monday said grading of a nearby parcel of land on which a new home is to be built could have instigated it.
“The grading may have caused a slope failure, which revealed a fault surface,” Kelly said. “When [the] earth gave way, it may have fractured an eight-inch water main that ran for a while before it could be shut off.”
The excess water, he said, could have exacerbated the landslide.
The failure occurred between 4 a.m. and 5 a.m. Friday morning just south of the intersection of Rambla Pacifico and Las Flores Canyon Road. It has affected the commute of about 20 homeowners south of the landslide, who must now use a three- to five-mile detour to head north.
Kelly said the utilities in the area were relocated on Friday and Saturday, and that water and electricity were restored Friday evening and Saturday morning.
Kelly said no damage estimates were available, but that it will likely take “several weeks at a minimum” to reconstruct the road. Plans to do so will be underway once the department meets with the project developers and consultants.
A number of roads were closed on Saturday, after a second round of rainstorms totaling 4.41 inches of rain in the 24-hour period worsened driving conditions with mudslides, falling boulders and rocks, and other debris.
Topanga Canyon Road and Pacific Coast Highway were closed until early Saturday morning. Later in the day, a large boulder was dislodged at the 20000 block of Pacific Coast Highway near Big Rock Drive, and mudflow and debris were reported near the 25000 block of Pacific Coast Highway, across from Puerco Canyon.
In the late morning, mud and rocks fell on Kanan-Dume Road and Pacific Coast Highway at Big Rock Mesa and Latigo Canyon, but both were cleared by afternoon.
The California Highway Patrol shut down the southbound lane of Malibu Canyon Road on Saturday from 2:30 p.m. to around 6 p.m. It was closed from the Hughes Research Lab to Piuma Road because of a rockslide near a tunnel, according to a report by the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff Department.
Topanga Canyon Road was closed again in both directions so that crews could clear debris and floodwater that had blocked the road between Topanga and Pacific Coast Highway. The road was opened later that evening.
Mild thunderstorms hit Malibu on Tuesday this week, but no rain is expected in the next 10 days, according to the National Weather Service.