Sandbags

More water gushed from additional floodgates opened Sunday to divert the swollen Mississippi River down a southern Louisiana floodplain, leaving residents of tiny towns in the water's path a grim choice: leave, or hope that the sandbags, levees and walls protecting them from inundation hold against the worst floods in decades. Nancy Allen, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in New Orleans, said two more gates were lifted at the giant Morganza Spillway, some 40 miles north of Baton Rouge, which was put into operation Saturday for the first time since 1973.

It took a lot of muscle to build the Whole Earth Building in Claremont, not to mention mud balls, sandbags and dirty hands. Opening April 20, the new headquarters of the nonprofit organization Uncommon Good has an uncommon green pedigree. The 2,500-square-foot building is a marriage of the ancient and high-tech.  A series of domed rectangular structures, it was constructed by hand with dirt dug from the site. A passive solar design will help warm rooms. Photovoltaics will light them.

The rains have dumped 5.17 inches on Downtown Los Angeles show no sign of letting up. Already the downpour has caused flooding and mudslides. With showers expected to continue, residents should know that they can take temporary emergency measures to protect their homes from further floods or mudslides.

NEW YORK CITY - Stay home. Unless you live in an evacuation area. In that case, the word from officials up and down the Northeast coast was: G o before it's too late . "Get out before you can't," Connecticut's governor, Dannel Malloy, told residents of his state early Monday as Hurricane Sandy's broad bands of high wind and heavy rain began hitting the region. From coastal Virginia up through Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey -- where Sandy was expected to make landfall -- through New York, Connecticut and northward, trees bent from the wind, foam-topped gray waves crashed over boardwalks and sea walls, and millions of people nervously awaited Sandy's wrath.

With heavy winter rains predicted, the city is providing sandbags for residents. "We have experienced problems with rain before and with El Nino. We want to be prepared," said Brian McClure of the city's Environmental Services Department. Sand and sandbags are available to La Mirada residents in the parking lot behind the county library in the civic center at 13700 La Mirada Blvd. Residents can take up to 10 bags per household, said McClure.

It was almost 12 years ago to the day that Terry McGough of Pasadena Glen first saw the walls of water from the San Gabriel Mountains that have made his neighborhood one of the most notorious in local flood control lore. In the space of a few days, torrential rains flooded into the narrow canyon, washing away three cars, burying a trailer in mud and leaving a trail of car-sized granite boulders from high up the mountain scattered over the roadway.

Kenny Senstad lives near a grim reminder of what mudslides have wrought in his community. It's a memorial, not far from his home in Montrose, marking the deaths of 12 people in the New Year's Eve flood of 1934 -- which followed a disastrous 1933 fire. "Every time I look at it, it reminds me of all the people that died," said Kenny, a 12-year-old Boy Scout. And that's why he came out Saturday morning to help fill sandbags at Dunsmore Park in La Crescenta, an event put on by the city of Glendale after two recent community meetings packed with residents voicing concerns about mudslides this winter following the devastating Station fire.

The water is coming. Ivy St. Romain could see it lapping against the boat ramp behind his house along Bayou Long, so dark and green he could barely make out the ragged tips of sunken cypress trees. "Yeah, it's coming," he said, "but I'm not going. I'm staying right here. " As the murky waters of the Atchafalaya River Basin slowly rise and threaten to swallow tiny Stephensville, population 1,433, most Cajuns who dominate this picturesque bayou town are hunkering down to fight the impending flood.

A powerful winter-like storm is expected to batter fire-ravaged hillsides in Los Angeles County with 3 to 6 inches of rain beginning tonight and lasting through early Wednesday morning. As news of the coming wet weather circulated Monday, residents in charred foothill areas scrambled to fill sandbags or pack their belongings and flee areas prone to flooding. Officials also worked to place huge concrete mudslide barriers along roads in areas including La Cañada Flintridge. The storm, which originated in the Gulf of Alaska, is expected to combine with moisture-laden remnants of a typhoon from the western Pacific, making the system wetter than normal, the National Weather Service said.

It took a lot of muscle to build the Whole Earth Building in Claremont, not to mention mud balls, sandbags and dirty hands. Opening April 20, the new headquarters of the nonprofit organization Uncommon Good has an uncommon green pedigree. The 2,500-square-foot building is a marriage of the ancient and high-tech.  A series of domed rectangular structures, it was constructed by hand with dirt dug from the site. A passive solar design will help warm rooms. Photovoltaics will light them.

NEW YORK - East Coast residents prepared Saturday for the onslaught of Hurricane Sandy, which forecasters expect to make landfall as soon as Monday night and then merge with a sprawling winter storm to create weather havoc for tens of millions of people across one-third of the nation. From Maine to the Carolinas, federal and state officials urged residents and businesses to prepare for the worst - drenching rain, flooding, high winds, highs seas, snow and widespread power outages.

Just about everybody in this forlorn fishing hamlet has moved to higher ground, leaving Tommy and Keith Girouard behind on their houseboat, "The Rockin' G. " But not everyone is as prepared as these two Cajuns to meet the rising brown waters of the Atchafalaya River. They don't need sandbags. They have a freezer full of Fudgesicles, three generators and a flat-screen TV. The brothers plan to ride out the coming flood in the comfort of the houseboat, which bobbed in the soft spring breeze along the canal behind Tommy's one-story river house, "The G Spot.

The water is coming. Ivy St. Romain could see it lapping against the boat ramp behind his house along Bayou Long, so dark and green he could barely make out the ragged tips of sunken cypress trees. "Yeah, it's coming," he said, "but I'm not going. I'm staying right here. " As the murky waters of the Atchafalaya River Basin slowly rise and threaten to swallow tiny Stephensville, population 1,433, most Cajuns who dominate this picturesque bayou town are hunkering down to fight the impending flood.

More water gushed from additional floodgates opened Sunday to divert the swollen Mississippi River down a southern Louisiana floodplain, leaving residents of tiny towns in the water's path a grim choice: leave, or hope that the sandbags, levees and walls protecting them from inundation hold against the worst floods in decades. Nancy Allen, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in New Orleans, said two more gates were lifted at the giant Morganza Spillway, some 40 miles north of Baton Rouge, which was put into operation Saturday for the first time since 1973.

Fighting in Bangkok continued for a third day Saturday with the death toll mounting to 17 as Thai troops fired live rounds in a bid to contain and isolate anti-government protesters encamped in a glitzy shopping district. With 150 wounded in recent days, the army issued a warning Saturday that the riot-hit neighborhood was now a "live firing zone," as soldiers took cover behind sandbags and on rooftops. Demonstrators faced them down behind barriers, wielding petrol bombs, stones, guns and homemade rockets, and vowed to maintain a siege that has already lasted two months.

The oil swirling in the Gulf of Mexico — broken up by dispersants and churned by winds and currents — has become an elusive giant, increasingly difficult to clean up but presenting a smaller, scattered threat if it reaches shore, U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen said Friday. "This spill is changing in its character," said Allen, President Obama's top commander in charge of responding to the spill. "I don't believe any longer that we have a large monolithic spill."

NEW YORK - East Coast residents prepared Saturday for the onslaught of Hurricane Sandy, which forecasters expect to make landfall as soon as Monday night and then merge with a sprawling winter storm to create weather havoc for tens of millions of people across one-third of the nation. From Maine to the Carolinas, federal and state officials urged residents and businesses to prepare for the worst - drenching rain, flooding, high winds, highs seas, snow and widespread power outages.

As a Pacific storm descended Tuesday night on Southern California, residents waited nervously to see whether rainfall would trigger mudslides in wildfire-ravaged areas. People stacked sandbags and positioned heavy concrete barriers against hillsides, transforming their homes into fortified bunkers. The storm system was first expected to dump 3 to 6 inches of rain in wildfire-charred areas in Los Angeles County. But the National Weather Service said that the system had weakened Tuesday afternoon after battering Northern California with heavy rainfall, and that L.A. County mountain areas would receive up to 4 inches of rain.

A powerful winter-like storm is expected to batter fire-ravaged hillsides in Los Angeles County with 3 to 6 inches of rain beginning tonight and lasting through early Wednesday morning. As news of the coming wet weather circulated Monday, residents in charred foothill areas scrambled to fill sandbags or pack their belongings and flee areas prone to flooding. Officials also worked to place huge concrete mudslide barriers along roads in areas including La Cañada Flintridge. The storm, which originated in the Gulf of Alaska, is expected to combine with moisture-laden remnants of a typhoon from the western Pacific, making the system wetter than normal, the National Weather Service said.