Flooding leads to a death in San Bernardino County
A flash flood watch continues for parts of San Bernardino and Riverside counties and other areas to the south. Monday night, a woman was killed when her sedan was carried away by fast-moving waters.
Scattered showers have caused flooding in some parts of the Inland Empire, leading to at least one fatality and prompting officials to issue a flash flood watch for parts of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, where forecasters expect more rain.
A San Bernardino County woman drowned Monday night after her sedan was washed away by fast-moving flood waters on a remote county road.
Rosemary Genc, 51, of Big River, was attempting to drive her Honda Accord across Rio Vista Road about 9 p.m. when the car was carried away, flipped and submerged in less than three feet of water, said Sandy Fatland, a spokeswoman for the San Bernardino County sheriff's coroner's division.
Genc was pronounced dead at the scene, Fatland said.
A flash flood watch will be in effect until 8 p.m. today for mountain areas of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, the Coachella Valley and the San Diego County backcountry, said National Weather Service officials.
"Obviously it's not going to be this morning because there's no clouds around," said Stan Wasowski, a forecaster with the National Weather Service in San Diego.
But he cautioned that even a little rain can prompt flooding, particularly in areas burned by recent wildfires.
"When the ground has been burned off, it actually seals the soil," Wasowski said. "There's no vegetation to hold the water down, so it will tend to run more."
The San Diego area already saw scattered rain Monday, as a weak cold front passed over the Los Angeles area and dropped rain to the south.
The tiny town of Campo, just north of the U.S.-Mexico border, was drenched with more than an inch of water Monday in less than an hour, Wasowski said.
Temperatures today are expected to remain at seasonal levels, in the 90s for inland areas, the mid-80s in the valleys and the 70s at the beaches, he said.
Los Angeles and Orange counties will be spared the rain, but the storms signal that fall Santa Ana winds are about to pick up, Wasowski said.
"No more lazy, hazy summer days," he said. "Now the fronts are moving in. It won't be long before we'll be getting the first offshore wind events."
molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com
