At 9:50 p.m. on Friday, March 22, Dustin Kinser, 29, of Aguanga, was driving a white 1990 Dodge Ram truck westbound on Highway 74, 1 mile east of Ribbonwood Drive, when, for unknown reasons, he made an unsafe turning movement. The vehicle careened into a guardrail, damaging 10 feet of the structure and causing moderate…
Cal Fire/Riverside County Here are some of the calls Cal Fire/Riverside County responded to recently. • March 21 — Residential fire, 11:39 a.m., 52000 block of Hwy. 74, Mountain Center. Interior destroyed. • March 22 — Medical aid, 9:43 a.m. Lake Hemet Campground. • March 24 — Medical aid, 3:07 p.m. Lake Hemet Campground. •…
The Valentine’s Day torrential rainstorm on Feb. 14, caused the closure of Highway 74 from Hemet to the west and Highway 243 from Banning to the south. Based on past closures, Hill residents were expecting the closures to last a week or more. However, the damage was much more extensive. The volume of water was…
The weekend was warm and sunny. The National Weather Service is forecasting more warming to the middle of the week. Light showers may come Wednesday night and early Thursday, but then significantly warmer temperatures next weekend should usher in April. In the longer-term, the NWS forecasts a higher-than-normal probability of precipitation for Southern California over…
The U.S. Forest Service announced that it is planning to proceed with its scheduled prescribed burn on Thomas Mountain in Garner Valley next week. The project’s goal is creation of community-scale defensible space and enhanced forest health. “On Monday, fire crews plan to conduct a test burn and, if all goes well, they…
After the Wednesday Caltrans press conference, the media was escorted to Highway 74, over the rupture at milepost 51 and east to the bottom of the Hill, where major work is being done to re-slope the hillside and reduce chances of significant rock or boulder slides. The following is brief photographic tour of…
After the Caltrans regional director and geotechnical official described the extensive damage and difficulty of repairs, Caltrans asked other local and federal officials to speak, especially about the social and community effects of the road closures. Riverside County Sheriff Lt. Alfonso Campa, of the Hemet Station, added that, because of the increase in…
Wednesday morning, March 20, Caltrans held a press conference at the U.S. Forest Service’s Cranston Fire Station to discuss the road situation and the county’s efforts to promote our town so the broader public knows it is still able to visit the mile-high hamlet of Riverside County. Only two days after the Mountain…
The winter of 2019 has been wet and cold, perhaps more typical of historic winter weather than recent winters. For example, the 2017-18 rain year was one of the driest on record in Southern California. In contrast, since the middle of January, the U.S. Forest Service’s Keenwild Station has recorded nearly 20 inches of rain….
In April 2017, after five years of little rain, the winter storms were more than sufficient for former Gov. Jerry Brown to rescind the state of emergency, which he declared in January 2014, because of the statewide drought. However, drought conditions persisted throughout the state, even though the worst seemed over. Then, the winter of…
