New Cave Fire Flood Map Gives Residents an Early Warning

Conflating the DIY (do-it-yourself) ethos and the Scouts’ motto to “be prepared,” the county released a new Cave Fire map to prepare residents as a rainstorm approached the Santa Barbara coast on Tuesday night. “The weather is always unpredictable, we tell people,” said county spokesperson Gina DePinto with a rueful laugh. “We thought Point Conception would shield us and the storm would blow away.” But as the clouds switched course and headed for Santa Barbara, a number of county departments and Los Padres National Forest officials gathered at the Office of Emergency Management to hammer out the map, De Pinto said, with input from the National Weather Service.

People have been asking for a map like this, she explained, as residents are very knowledgeable about debris flows and flooding since the Thomas Fire aftermath. And, after all, Santa Barbara is entering its rainy season. The interactive map enables residents to type in their address to learn if they are in an area that could be affected by flooding or debris from the Cave Fire watershed above them.

The amount of rain coming Tuesday night would not top flood or debris flow thresholds, DePinto said. Mark Jackson with the National Weather Service (NWS) called it a “well-behaved storm” that dropped relatively good amounts of water — 1.47 inches fell at the Goleta yard — but not in a deluge that would overtop the flood basins below the Cave Fire footprint.