San Luis Obispo County Fire dispatch received over 400 emergency calls in a span of 24 hours during the peak of the latest storm.
CAL FIRE Assistant Chief Tom Swanson says the county's Urban Search and Rescue team has received four callouts for rescues since Saturday.
“One of them ended up being a stranded vehicle down to South County in the Nipomo Mesa area in which we assisted a stranded victim up to safe ground up the riverbank," Swanson explained.
With storms of this magnitude, they receive daily updates from the National Weather Service so they're prepared to assist if needed here or in neighboring counties.
With dryer weather on Tuesday, USAR teams practiced their water rescue skills in the Salinas River in Templeton.
“The creeks and rivers are still flowing to an unsafe point," Swanson noted. "We like to tell everybody to heed the warnings of the road closed signs. The big slogan that we promote is 'turn around, don't drown.' And it only takes about 12 to 18 inches of moving water to actually float a vehicle down a creek or river.”
The USAR team will remain at the ready to respond to emergencies as rain continues over the next few days.
