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Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
World
Christopher Weber, Associated Press & Stefanie Dazio, Associated Press

Five-year-old boy swept away by floodwaters as storm hits California

A five-year-old boy was swept away by floodwaters as a powerful storm hit California.

Tens of thousands of people remain without power and some schools are closed for the day.

Streets and highways transformed into gushing rivers and trees toppled when the storm hit on Monday.

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The death toll from the relentless string of storms climbed from 12 to 14, after two people were killed by falling trees, state officials said.

A seven-hour search for the missing boy turned up only his shoe before officials called it off as water levels were too dangerous for divers.

The boy has not been declared dead, spokesperson Tony Cipolla of the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff's Office said.

The boy's mother was driving a truck when it became stranded in floodwaters just before 8 am near Paso Robles, a small city inland from California's central coast.

Bystanders were able to pull the mother out of the truck, but the boy was swept out of the vehicle and downstream, likely into a river. There was no evacuation order in the area at the time.

About 130 miles (209 kilometres) to the south, the entire community of Montecito was under an evacuation order.

It came on the fifth anniversary of a mudslide that killed 23 people and destroyed more than 100 homes.

In Los Angeles, a sinkhole swallowed two cars on Monday night. Two people escaped by themselves and firefighters using ropes and an aerial ladder rescued two others who had minor injuries, authorities said.

The National Weather Service reported rainfall rates of one inch (2.5 centimetres) per hour.

Montecito is squeezed between mountains and the Pacific Ocean and is home to celebrities including Rob Lowe and Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

Ellen DeGeneres shared an Instagram video of herself standing in front of a raging creek near the Montecito home where she lives with her wife, actor Portia de Rossi.

She said in the post that they were told to shelter in place because they are on high ground.

"This is crazy!" the talk show host, wearing a hoodie and raincoat, says in the video. "This creek next to our house never flows, ever. It's probably about nine feet up and is going to go another two feet up."

Ellen DeGeneres shared an Instagram video of herself standing in front of her Montecito home (Ellen DeGeneres/Twitter)

The National Weather Service warned of a "relentless parade of atmospheric rivers" - long plumes of moisture stretching out into the Pacific that can drop staggering amounts of rain and snow. The precipitation expected over the next couple of days comes after storms last week knocked out power, flooded streets, and battered the coastline.

President Joe Biden issued an emergency declaration Monday to support storm response and relief efforts in more than a dozen counties.

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