Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Monsoon season:

Downpours leave residents in Sunrise Manor area with streets, yards, houses flooded

Vegas Flooding

Brian Ramos

Robert Rodriguez, the brother of the homeowner Carlos Rodriguez, help sweep water back on to the streets and away from their property on N.Clayton St in East Las Vegas. Monday, August 15th, 2022.

Vegas Flooding

Robert Rodriguez, the brother of the homeowner Carlos Rodriguez, help sweep water back on to the streets and away from their property on N.Clayton St in East Las Vegas. Monday, August 15th, 2022. Launch slideshow »

As the sky was turning gray in northeast Las Vegas last week, Carlos Rodriguez was on the phone with his mother, talking about how ominous it looked.

He recalled that, at the time, he wasn’t worried, even though it’s monsoon season in the valley, and in their Sunrise Manor neighborhood, monsoon rains often mean flooding.

The next telephonic communication came a few hours later from his daughter, using FaceTime. Rain was falling and water was seeping into their house on North Clayton Drive. Family members were able to see water leaking under the doorways in real time. It was just the start.

“I had two feet of water inside my house,” Rodriguez said. “Never did I think that those (dark) clouds would bring rain like that.”

By Monday the rains had been gone for about three days at the residence near Stewart Avenue and North Fogg Street, but the damage was still evident.

Rodriguez stood outside his house with his brother Robert in a puddle of mud overlooking pooling brown water in the middle of his street. He takes off his red San Francisco 49ers glasses and wipes his glistening forehead as his feet sink into the floor marked by other deep imprints of his mud-caked sneakers. Carlos and Robert have been clearing water from the property since it flooded after, according to the National Weather Service, 0.67 inches of rain dumped on the area late last week.

This part of town is vulnerable to floods due to pockets of low ground and a small storm drain, Carlos Rodriguez said. He somberly added, “It’s never been this bad.”

Las Vegas is experiencing one of its wettest monsoon seasons in years. Jarring videos and images are being shared on social media of Las Vegas Strip parking garages flooding or water leaking through ceilings onto casino floors. Thus far this monsoon season, emergency responders have recovered the bodies of two people found dead in flood channels in the Las Vegas Valley.

Since monsoon season began June 15, the National Weather Service has recorded 1.28 inches of rainfall at its official Las Vegas measurement station at Harry Reid International Airport.

At the halfway-point of the season, monsoon rains are saturating the entire valley.

Take the storms on July 28, when the Clark County Regional Flood Control District said water depth had risen to over 16 feet in the Tropicana Detention Basin near Russell Road and Decatur Boulevard.

On the same night, as winds hit 70 mph, Fremont Street Experience had water flowing through the tourist attraction, and the ceiling collapsed at a downtown Las Vegas sportsbook.

All of the storms cause worries for Rodriguez and his neighbors.

“Something has to be done about this,” Rodriguez said. “We can’t keep having this every year.”

Serene Temple, a Las Vegas native who lives a block over from Rodriguez on Lailani Street, also had to watch as her entire half-acre yard, house and barn filled with water.

Even her duck was avoiding the more than three-inch pond that developed after 30 minutes of hard rain.

Temple and her young sons — a 3-year-old and a 6-year-old — were forced to relocate due to the sheer damage caused by the calf-high levels of water that rushed around her property.

Temple’s animals — some cats, the duck, a “traumatized” Great Dane and a pig — all made it through and remain in her backyard, which has since been cleaned up. Her home is still in the process of being dried, but she says they aren’t in the clear yet. Her family’s furniture and clothing are “ruined.”

After an asbestos check, Temple will receive an estimate on the damages, she said. If the damages exceed $150,000, a cleanup crew told Temple her property could be demolished.

Temple, much like the Rodriguez brothers, blamed the existing storm drain. One of Temple’s neighbors had to come and help her clean out the “trash, mud and sediment” while the water still sat in her backyard.

Rodriguez said the drain on their street just seemed too small to help carry out all of the water that pooled on the road and into his property.

“The only way to prevent this is having the storm drains cleaned,” Temple said. “I feel like the county should be held responsible for not having these drains cleared.”

The Regional Flood Control District is surveying the aftermath of the most recent storms and working with the county to establish some projects that would help with gathering storm runoff, spokeswoman Michelle French said.

One project is an expansion of the Orchard Detention Basin — an earth dam built for flood control — at the end of East Charleston Boulevard. The first side was completed in 2017, and the design for the remaining portion is almost complete, French said. In the interim, French stresses the flood control district “really (relies) on” community members reporting flooded areas.

“What we really want is our community to reach out to us and report any clogged storm drains they may see,” French said.

But residents of Sunrise Manor want more.

Temple said her neighbors approached the county about adding a storm drain years before Temple moved in and got one installed, but they haven’t seen improvement since then.

Erik Pappa, director of public communications in Clark County, said they “did get a lot of debris on the roads on Sunrise Mountain Friday afternoon,” and that crews were sent to the area for cleanup once the rain stopped and floodwaters cleared from roadways.

“Our public works staff were diligent in responding to the flooding and clearing the roads quickly to allow residents to travel without long delays,” Pappa said. “These same staff also have been working hard to clean up multiple flood detention basins countywide to prepare for another possible round of monsoon rains this week. I understand that overall the flood control facilities and drains worked well.”

To Rodriguez, Temple and their Sunrise Manor neighbors, the overall picture is of little consolation as they worry about the next monsoon downpour.