Mudslide Closes 241 and 91 Freeways for Hours

All eastbound lanes of the Riverside (91) Freeway and the northbound lanes of the 241 on the border of Orange and Riverside counties were blocked for several hours by a mud and rock slide today, authorities reported.

The debris flow was reported west of Green River Road, and just west of the Riverside County line in Orange County, around 2 a.m, according to the California Highway Patrol’s online incident log. The flow trapped five to seven vehicles, it said.

The transition lanes from the northbound Eastern Transportation Corridor (241) to the eastbound 91 were also closed, the log reported.

Shortly after 7 a.m., CHP officers began reopening the FasTrak lane and the Numbers 1, 2 and 3 lanes on the 91, the CHP reported.

CHP Sgt. T. Koehler said the debris flow occurred at a point where the base of an adjacent hillside was about 20 feet from freeway lanes.

Koehler said the debris flow came from a recently burned area of the hillside and spread across seven lanes and both shoulders of the eastbound freeway. A fire that originated on the freeway when a pickup truck burst into flames after a collision with another vehicle spread to 25 acres of the adjacent hillside on Sept. 10.

Vehicles caught in the debris today were finally extricated almost two hours after the initial incident, according to the incident log.

The storms that swept Orange and L.A. counties took their toll on freeway traffic, with four separate incidents reported in 14 minutes on separate stretches of the southbound Golden State (5) freeway from 4:08 a.m., authorities said.

• City News Service
• Photo Credit: Twitter user Marc Cota-Robles ‏@ABC7MarcCR