Floods, mud hit California

PETALUMA, Calif. -- A powerful storm set off mudslides that blocked major highways and that sent rivers and creeks over their banks and into cities across Northern California yesterday. At least a half-dozen people were rescued from the rushing water, and forecasters were warning of another storm today.

Officials in California urged residents along the Napa and Russian Rivers, and on hillsides, to collect their valuables, gather emergency supplies, and get out.

In the city of Napa, near the heart of wine country, the river was 5 feet over flood stage. Further inland, Reno, Nev., was experiencing its worst flooding since a 1997 flood caused $1 billion in damage.

Firefighters in the Sonoma area rescued two people from a mobile home park, where 4 feet of rushing water washed at least one home off its foundation. Officials were searching for a third person, said the Sonoma Valley Fire Authority's division chief, Bob Norrbom.

Cars floated through the park, pushed by the water.

Elsewhere, television footage showed a stranded driver being plucked from the back of a pickup truck by a rescue helicopter, and another person being pulled to safety through the waters in the Sonoma area.

Rick Diaz went out into a flooded Petaluma neighborhood in a 14-foot Zodiac boat on his own to save residents and pets.

''He's a hero," said a tearful Suzi Keber after Diaz rescued two pet lizards from her home.

In downtown San Anselmo, the creek overflowed into as many as 70 businesses, said town administrator Debbie Stutsman. Two people rescued from the rising water there were hospitalized with hypothermia, she said.

''I'm looking out of my office now at merchants bringing their damaged goods out into the street," Stutsman said. ''The entire downtown area was under 4.5 feet of water. It's pretty bad all across town," she said.

Meteorologists had warned that parts of Sonoma, Sacramento, Shasta, and Tehama counties were ripe for their worst flooding in years, and they said severe flooding was anticipated upstream in Calistoga, St. Helena and Yountville, as well.

In St. Helena, the Napa River was at record levels, seven feet over flood stage. The last record flood there destroyed dozens of homes and businesses.

Mudslides closed several major roads, including Interstate 80 in the Sierra Nevada about 25 miles west of Reno. Six tractor-trailer rigs were caught up in one slide on the interstate, but no injuries were reported.

The major national east-west highway, I-80, the major corridor linking Northern California and points east, was expected to remain closed for at least two days, said California Department of Transportation spokesman Mark Dinger.

''No work can be done until the slide stabilizes and we don't know when that will occur," Dinger said.

The Russian River at the Sonoma County town of Guerneville could rise as high as 11 feet above flood stage after if the storm expected today hits as expected, officials said.