A storm front that closed schools and snarled Northern California traffic has many Bay Area residents bracing for more flooding with another storm this weekend.
The region was hit hard Friday morning. Schools were shuttered, and residents snapped up sandbags. Nearly 400 flights were delayed because of weather at San Francisco International Airport and about 75 were canceled, most of them smaller planes, officials said.
Roads were closed because of floods and mudslides. The closures included a portion of California Highway 1 in Mendocino County where overnight slides nearly toppled a California Department of Transportation dump truck with an employee inside. The truck hit a guardrail -- stopping its fall -- and landed at a 45-degree angle. The employee was uninjured.
Scattered power outages affected several thousand people.
The latest in a series of storms moved in Thursday night, adding more moisture to an already wet March that has resulted in mudslides and swollen creeks. A mudslide was likely to blame for a commuter train that derailed east of San Francisco on Monday, injuring nine.
Bobby Rehfeldt of Goodman Building Supply off U.S. 101 in Mill Valley, said Friday that most of the customers in the busy store were thrilled with the rain, although some are understandably unhappy about leaks.
"Lots of people are buying tarps and roof patch and heat guns to dry stuff up, anything for getting water off the ground, and sandbags are flying out of here,'' he said. "It's just rain, and we need it.''
California is entering its fifth year of drought, and water watchers say anything helps, although it will take years of normal or above-normal rainfall to right the deficit.
Several Sonoma County schools closed Friday because of fears that the Russian River would flood. But by the afternoon, forecasters had cancelled warnings for major rivers.
Still, the Russian River was running high and fast Friday with vineyards submerged and streets closed. At a trailer park in Forestville mere feet from the river, a resident was moving his dog and trailer to drier land.
