Watch CBS News

Northern California Town Completely Underwater, Residents Evacuated

MAXWELL (KPIX 5 ) -- Saturday's break in the rain wasn't much help for people in the Colusa County community of Maxwell. The small town northwest of Sacramento is completely underwater and pretty much deserted.

People were forced to flee their homes in the middle of the night as the floodwaters rose fast around them.

Malcolm white has lived in Maxwell for 27 years. He's never seen anything like this.

"Never," he says.

Early Saturday morning 150 people were evacuated.

Our Sheriff's deputies had to go door to door because a lot of people were sleeping and didn't realize the water levels had risen so quickly," said Assistant Sheriff Jim Saso.

Those who were awake thought they had enough time.

"The water had been backing up into people's yards and people decided to start sand bagging. It was a little too late and the water just out ran them out."

Maxwell is an older town and it doesn't have the best drainage system for all this water.
A few homes and businesses like Hydro AG are completely flooded.

"A foot to a foot-and-a-half of water inside of them," said Saso.

As the water levels start to recede many will be returning to their homes, but officials worry another evacuation may be necessary.

"I don't know if the worst has passed because another storm coming Monday," says Saso.

Meantime, just down the road from Maxwell on Interstate 5 it looks more like the edge of an ocean.

Flooding has reduced the freeway to one lane each way through much of that area and traffic was at a crawl.

View CBS News In
CBS News App Open
Chrome Safari Continue
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.