The Sun
Sunnyvale's Newspaper

Photograph by Robert Scheer

Despite heavy rains and flooding, this cyclist braved a swamped Central Expressway near Fair Oaks on Feb. 3.

Mother Nature Strikes

El Niño, Mother Nature's tempermental child, has finally arrived

By Steve Enders

El Niño left its first mark on Sunnyvale, as it did on the entire state, last week.

Damaged buildings, power outages, flooding and even a tornado all affected Sunnyvale during the week of bad weather.

However, Sunnyvale came out relatively unscathed compared to many other nearby cities that didn't fare quite so well.

Lockheed and Moffett Field got a scare during Friday's storm, though, as a small tornado swept through the federal property.

According to Lockheed's Pat Cooper, the tornado touched down at 9 a.m. Friday. Traveling northbound through NASA property then onto Lockheed's, the tornado died over the bay.

Cooper said nobody was hurt, but the tornado did cause light damage to some roofs and fan housings attached to Lockheed buildings.

Despite a second set of storms over the weekend, Sunnyvale did not experience any additional major problems. Some parking lots experienced minor "ponding" according to city officials.

Monday of last week, however, was a bad day for the Bay Area, as Palo Alto, San Jose and Santa Clara had declared states of emergency after the strongest of the week's storms blew through the South Bay.

As of Tuesday, schools, businesses, highways and roads were closed all around the county.

In Sunnyvale, early reports from the city's public works department indicated that major flooding had occurred in the north Sunnyvale area, including the Lakewood Village neighborhood and Calabazas Creek region.

Those reports were premature, as water had subsided enough to drive through most of those areas with no problem by Tuesday.

Lakewood Village was dry, as were the roads around Calabazas Creek except for a thin layer of mud that still clung to the roads. In north Sunnyvale, however, some large pools of water remained, especially in business parking lots along Carribean Drive and the side streets connecting those lots.

The parking lots of businesses such as TRW, Actra and Digital, which are all on Carribean Drive, were just about empty on what should have been a busy workday, because they were all under water.

The only cars that were in the lot apparently couldn't beat the storm. A BMW parked in a low-lying area still had water up over its hood on Tuesday afternoon.

But some other area businesses didn't just have parking lots to worry about.

Water damage occurred in many different commercial buildings, and was so bad at Somnus Technologies' offices on Wolfe Road and Arques Avenue that a section of its roof collapsed during the storm on Monday afternoon.

Somnus's Steve Rudy said nobody was hurt, and the problem was fixed by Tuesday evening.

"It kept us closed for a day and a half," Rudy said. "We've just got a bunch of wet paper and carpets."

A power outage at Lakewood Elementary School on Tuesday forced children to stay home that day. The school still did not have power through Wednesday afternoon. No other area residences were affected by the power outage.

An arcing power line near the school caused the problem, literally melting a nearby transformer and the school's power panel, according to Lakewood Principal Shelly James.

She said that the school's 620 kids were not happy about having to stay home from school.

"We've got a big hospital generator here," James said Wednesday morning. "We've got lights, and we've got kids today."

Lakewood's power problems were fixed by Thursday.

Other power outages affected portions of Sunnyvale for about an hour Tuesday morning.

According to Public Works, some outages occurred around the city, forcing the department to put up temporary traffic stops at some intersections.

Also, Central Expressway was closed Tuesday afternoon because of mud and fallen trees covering the road between Mary Avenue and Wolfe Road.

At last week's City Council meeting, councilmembers took a moment to thank the departments of Public Safety and Public Works on jobs well done during the heavy rains.

City Manager Robert LaSala said city crews had been working since 1 a.m. Tuesday clearing storm drains and monitoring rising water around the city.

"I'm really pleased with the response," he told the council. "I'm assured that we'll continue to check the levees around Sunnyvale, and we'll watch the situation as the week progresses."

Councilman Fred Fowler also proffered his thanks.

"I felt proud that Sunnyvale was so well-prepared for this storm," he said.

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This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, February 11, 1998.
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