Storm Brings Lightning, More than Three Inches of Rain to Parts of Santa Barbara County

Santa Barbarians hunkered down for the storm and received flood warnings on Wednesday morning and night, which started just before 7:30 a.m. on Wednesday, with a break in the afternoon before another downpour that evening. “Some of the cells that came through were really heavy,” said Santa Barbara County Fire Captain Michael Gray.

San Marcos Pass saw the most rain during the storm, clocking nearly three and a half inches as of Thursday morning, according to the county’s rainfall report. According to the National Weather Service, the KTYD Towers station — located above Gibraltar in the Santa Ynez Mountain Range overlooking Santa Barbara — reported a total of 2.66 inches between 4 a.m. Wednesday and 5 a.m. Thursday. Stations in Goleta, Lake Cachuma and Figueroa Mountain reported between 1.18 and 1.55 inches, while Santa Maria got less than one inch. 

Lightning bolted across the sky and thunder rumbled through the streets as waves crashed over the harbor jetty. A pair of sailors on the water off the coast of Isla Vista got caught in the weather, and their vessel, a small sailboat, crashed into the cliffs off of Lagoon Road about 7 p.m. on Wednesday night. 

On land, Highway 101 saw spinouts and rollovers throughout the day and into Thursday. 

Just before 11 a.m. Wednesday, a truck went off of northbound Highway 101 and rolled over onto the railroad tracks just north of El Capitan State Beach. Santa Barbara County Fire, California Highway Patrol, and paramedics responded to the scene, pulled the minorly injured driver from the vehicle. The driver was transported to Cottage Hospital for further care.

At about 10 p.m. Wednesday night, multiple cars spun out on Southbound Highway 101 near Padaro Lane in Carpineria.

On Thursday, California Highway Patrol reported a spinout on the southbound 101 just after 1 p.m. a few miles down the road from Wednesday’s rollover crash. At about 2:30 p.m., County Fire reported a traffic collision on the 101 after it turned into the hills after passing Gaviota. 

Although these incidents haven’t been confirmed to be caused because of the rain, the weather more than likely played a factor in them. 

County Fire’s Captain Gray said that since the storm hit, there has been some minor flooding, a few branches down — including on Mountain Drive and into the Dargan’s building on Ortega Street — and a couple of downed powerlines. “But overall, it was all just very minor,” he said.   

Despite getting over three inches of rain in parts of the county, “believe it or not, there is still a fire threat,” said Captain Gray. “High fire season hasn’t been called off yet, it would take more rain to begin to make that transition.”

On Thursday afternoon, another flood watch was issued for Santa barbara County and remains in effect until 6 p.m.