Mudslide Blocks Main Road Through Santa Cruz Mountains
FELTON (KPIX 5) -- Amid non-stop rain Wednesday, a massive rock and mud slide has closed a portion of a busy road in the Santa Cruz Mountains near Highway 35.
In a month filled with some spectacular mudslides, this one is the most dramatic we've seen so far - a huge chunk of the cliff along upper Zayante Road two miles south of Highway 35 is gone.
The cliff portion goes all the way up to the top, some 50 or 60 feet with a pitch of almost 90 degrees. When it slid down it took out a couple trees.
"It's big," said resident Cree Armstrong. "I don't think it's going to get fixed any time soon."
The hillside is so steep and muddy, you couldn't even get across on foot, let alone a car.
Armstrong said he will have to take a one hour detour to get to San Jose for work. But even with all this, there's no way she'd move out of the mountains.
"Everybody's got their problems," laughed Armstrong.
The county says the big concern now is the wind, combined with ground that is already waterlogged and soggy, and trees on steep hillsides are especially vulnerable.
The heroes of the storms continue to be the crews who have been doing the dirty work round-the-clock to try and stay ahead of the storms.
Santa Cruz County has a dozen hotspots that either have a band-aid repair, or still need work from last week's pineapple express storm.
One crew trying to unclog a drain before the mud runs off and causes more problems downhill was not making progress Wednesday afternoon, they told this reporter.
"Is it working?"
"No."
"So what happens if it clogs?"
"It'll wash down the hill."
"And make an even bigger mess?"
"Yeah."
