Six homes evacuated, damaged 'after series of heavy rains' cause Santa Clarita landslide

Noah Goldberg
·2 min read
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SANTA CLARITA, CA - FEBRUARY 06: A hillside behind homes on Plume Way in the Santa Clarita neighborhood of Canyon Country slid down to Lambent Way damaging the sidewalk. Photographed on Monday, Feb. 6, 2023 in Santa Clarita, CA. (Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
A hillside behind homes on Plume Way in the Santa Clarita neighborhood of Canyon Country slid down to Lambent Way, damaging the sidewalk on Monday. (Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

Six homes in Santa Clarita were evacuated after they were damaged by a collapsing hill in a residential development, authorities said.

The "slope failure" occurred around 2 p.m. Sunday on Plume Way when about eight feet of backyards behind homes in the Tri Pointe Homes development slid down into the houses in the Canyon Country neighborhood, said Carrie Lujan, a spokeswoman for the city. Nobody was injured.

A landslide damaged a sidewalk, pushing it up and away.
A sidewalk on Lambent way is damaged after Monday's landslide in the Santa Clarita area. (Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

The six affected residences were yellow-tagged by a city building inspector, meaning residents can still access their homes but cannot sleep there.

The Los Angeles County Fire Department monitored the hillside throughout the night Sunday into Monday, but no further slippage was observed, Lujan said.

"The developer of the project is working with their geotechnical engineer to handle the repairs, and once they have mitigated the issue, the City will do everything it can to expedite the inspections and permits to get the residents back home as safely and swiftly as possible," Lujan said.

The developer said that the "landslip" was due to the "series of heavy rains" that recently hit California, according to a statement provided to KCBS-TV Channel 2.

"We are working with the impacted homeowners, including covering their costs for intermediary housing, while a remediation plan is being developed to stabilize and rebuild the slope," Tri Pointe Homes said in the statement. "At this time, there does not appear to be issues on other slopes in the Skyline community. We will, however, continue to closely monitor the situation under the guidance of geotechnical experts."

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.