High winds cause problems in Santa Paula

By Peggy Kelly Santa Paula TimesOn Saturday and Sunday the high winds blew hard, wreaking havoc all over the state including fire - a raging blaze as of Monday was still consuming homes in Fallbrook halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego - and a fatality, when a Simi Valley tennis player was crushed by a tree.In the Santa Clara River Valley corridor, gusts hit up to 90 mph, shattering windows, cleaning porches of everything not nailed down and causing roofs to shed tiles like a deck of magician’s cards gone astray. A fire was probably related to the wind, and a mobile home losing its roof was assuredly due to the powerful gusts. Two power poles located at the corner of 5th Street and Harvard Boulevard “snapped in half like toothpicks,” according to a witness to the aftermath, which left many homes in the surrounding area without power until late Sunday afternoon. A massive tree located near the intersection of Encino Place and Richmond Road toppled in the high winds, and palm trees throughout the city shed fronds as they were whipped by the strong gusts.There were power outages, power surges, power brown-outs and cable television power failures for intervals throughout the weekend.“The Santa Paula Fire Department had a ton of calls over the weekend,” in fact, nine related to the relentless winds, said Acting Fire Chief Rick Araiza.“There was a fire on Peralta underneath a spa. . .we can’t figure out where that started as the owner had the power cut to it.”The early Sunday fire was reported at 12:38 a.m. and appeared to have started under the deck of the spa and was fully involved when firefighters arrived on scene. The blaze - which could have started from a flying spark - was knocked down but the spa and deck destroyed.Just under three hours later, at 3 a.m. on Feb. 10, the roof was blown off a mobile home and adjoining carport on Santa Maria Street.