The levee breach occurred as California was hit by its tenth atmospheric river of the winter season.
A Northern California agricultural community famous for its strawberry crop was forced to evacuate early Saturday after the Pajaro River’s levee was breached by flooding that pummeled the state.
Across Monterey County, more than 8,500 people were under evacuation orders and warnings Saturday, including roughly 1,700 residents — many of them Latino farmworkers — from the unincorporated community of Pajaro.
In a news conference Saturday afternoon, Lew Bauman with the Monterey County Water Resources Agency said the levee breached at about midnight Friday. Bowman said the breach was about 120 feet long.
« It continues to flow, it will flow uncontrolled until we are able to secure that with interim protective measures, » Bowman said.
Personnel from the California Department of Water Resources were en route to « formulate a mitigation plan » to « close that breach, » Bowman added.
Bauman said that as the water flow continues in the coming days, more evacuation warnings and orders will be issued as necessary.
Monterey County Sheriff Tina Nieto, meanwhile, said that crews conducted 90 rescues Friday night and Saturday.
Crews had gone door to door Friday afternoon to urge residents to leave before the rains came but some stayed and had to be pulled from floodwaters early Saturday.
One video showed a member of the Guard helping a driver out of a car trapped by water up to their waists.
« We were hoping to avoid and prevent this situation, but the worst case scenario has arrived with the Pajaro River overtopping and levee breaching at about midnight, » wrote Luis Alejo, chair of the Monterey County Board of Supervisors, on Twitter.
Alejo called the flooding « massive, » saying the damage will take months to repair.
The Pajaro River separates the counties of Santa Cruz and Monterey in the area that flooded Saturday. Floodwaters that got into the region’s wells might be contaminated with chemicals, officials said, and residents were told not to drink or cook with tap water for fear of illness.
Officials had been working along the levee in the hopes of shoring it up when it was breached around midnight Friday into Saturday.
