Wild weather Saturday brings flood of neighborliness in East Bay
DUBLIN -- On Saturday, the atmospheric river arrived as predicted. Rain came down in a torrent in the East Bay; water poured down hillside neighborhoods in Alamo.
That's where Katie Nittler was working to free a storm drain, to keep her front yard from becoming a lake.
"I walked the dog up to the top of the hill and there's just so much water," she said. "So, it's just trying to clear it as much as we could."
Down the street, Tom Schulz was happily walking his dog, Brittney. Neither seemed bothered by the deluge that was turning a normally placid drainage creek into a raging river.
"This is a normal winter. This is what we should be having, right?" Schulz said. "You know, the last few years have been dry and not a whole lot going on and now, with this type of rainstorm, it's a blessing, quite frankly."
But that blessing also caused plenty of problems.
The Oakland fire department reported a building on the 700 block of W. Grand Avenue collapsed under the weight of water on the roof. Mudslides were common on East Bay freeways and tow trucks were kept busy pulling cars off roads. Drivers soon found it was a good idea to stay in the middle lanes to avoid hitting pooled roadside water.
On Interstate 580, between Dublin and Castro Valley, Gina Wong was driving in a heavy downpour and remembered what it looked like.
"There's all these puddles and people are hydroplaning left and right," she said.
That's when the dashcam on her Tesla recorded a car sliding across four lanes of traffic, miraculously missing oncoming cars and catapulting into the air as it slammed into the side of the road.
"I knew I wanted to check on whoever it was," Gina said. "So, I see her come out of the car and I just hugged her and I'm, like, 'it's OK!' And she's, like, shaking."
Hana Jan was behind the wheel and the dashcam video shows her collapsing into Gina's arms. Later, Jan said it was the wildest ride of her life.
"It slid and flipped onto the mud here, on this curb." she said. "Like a 360 all the way -- a 470 -- whatever you want to call it."
To make matters worse, the car ended up with its rear tire caught in a drainage basin and it looked like to wasn't going anywhere.
That's when an angel arrived to help -- literally. Angel Martinez was driving from Modesto to his job in Oakland when he saw Hana's predicament and he knew how to help.
"A lot of people get stuck sometimes and I pull them out with the truck or the trailer," he said.
Angel tied a strap from the trailer he was hauling to the front of Hana's car and, within seconds, pulled it out of the mud and back out onto the highway. He said he knew it would work because it's the fourth time he's done something like that.
"I saw someone was stuck and I'm going to help 'em out," Martinez said. "I just like it when people are helping out ... even in the rain, doesn't matter. Even when I'm on the clock, I still help them out."
"God bless you guys!" Jan called out to the people who stopped to help. "Oh my God, it's New Year's and I, like, I really didn't want today to be like this, you know?"