LOS ANGELES (AP) — Snow shut down a key interstate north of Los Angeles for hours on Monday while weekend downpours doused wildfires across Southern California in the first significant storm of the season for the region that had not seen rainfall for eight months. As much as an inch of rain fell, posing another challenge as the wet weather loosened LA hillsides burned bare by the recent blaze near the Pacific Palisades , where crews working before dawn cleared inundated roadways including the famed Pacific Coast Highway. Ash and mud flowed across streets in charred neighborhoods, and flood watches were in effect for the Palisades, Altadena and Castaic Lake areas.
“All these fresh burns are very susceptible to rapid runoff,” said Joe Sirard, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service’s office for Los Angeles. In Malibu, four schools were closed Monday “due to dangerous road conditions,” the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District said in a statement. In southern Kern County, snowy conditions late Sunday shut down the mountainous Tejon Pass section of Interstate 5, a key north-south artery for the state.
It reopened Monday afternoon. In Southern California, I-5 rises to more than 4,100 feet (1,250 meters) in Tejon Pass between Los Angeles and the San Joaquin Valley, making it susceptible to storm closures, especially on the steep section known as the Grapevine. Mountains across San Bernardino and Riverside counties were under a winter storm warning Monday .
