Toddler found dead after mudslides and flash floods in Southern California

A child was swept away and died, homes were damaged and some roads were blocked after heavy rain swept over parched land on the night of Sept 18, bringing mudslides and flooding to parts of Southern California, the authorities said.

The body of Xavier Padilla Aguilera, two, who was separated from his father after powerful floodwaters pushed the vehicle they were in off a road at about 7pm on Sept 18 in Barstow, California, was found at 2.44pm on Sept 19 in a channel used by San Bernardino County for flood control, the police said.

Xavier’s father, Mr Brandon Padilla Aguilera, 26, was found alive on an island created by floodwaters and was rescued by city firefighters, according to the police in Barstow, a city in San Bernardino County about 161km north-east of Los Angeles. He was treated at Barstow Community Hospital and released.

An evacuation warning was declared on the afternoon of Sept 19 for portions of the Forest Falls, Angelus Oaks, Seven Oaks and Oak Glen communities, according to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Office.

The rain came from the remnants of Tropical Storm Mario, which formed on Sept 12 and weakened this week. The storm moved first into Southern California, spreading across the Los Angeles area on Sept 17. One location in the mountains of Ventura County received nearly 5.8cm of rain.

Heavy rain is unusual at this time of the year in Southern California, where the summer heat typically leaves the ground parched and prone to wildfires. Even a scant amount of rain can set off a landslide when it saturates the dry ground.

This was what happened on the evening of Sept 18, causing mud and debris to flow into residential areas, affecting homes and leaving several roads impassable, according to social media updates from the San Bernardino County Fire Protection District.

Some of the affected parts of the county included the communities of Forest Falls, Oak Glen and Potato Canyon, according to the fire protection agency, which published images of roads strewed with debris. The extent of the damage to houses and infrastructure was immediately clear on Sept 19.

Mr Jacob Schoolfield, 27, and his fiancee, Ms Siena Hermon, 23, were driving from their home in Big Bear, California, to Los Angeles International Airport on Sept 18 when they encountered what Mr Schoolfield described as a 122m crevasse in the middle of State Route 38, which crosses mountainous areas in San Bernardino.

He said that a 1.8m-deep pool of sludge had formed, stretching for roughly 0.6km behind them. The couple were stranded.

“It was completely impassable,” said Mr Schoolfield, who was on his way to catch a flight to Spain.

Mr Schoolfield said that he, Ms Hermon and the occupants of 11 other vehicles were trapped on that road for roughly 14 hours, until the California Department of Transportation cleared enough debris so they could drive home. No one was injured, although Mr Schoolfield described the experience as “a little traumatic”.

“When we left Big Bear, it was blue skies and sunny,” he said, adding that he and Ms Hermon, who grew up in the area, had no knowledge of the flood risks when they set out for the airport at around 2.30pm on Sept 18.

The rain began to pick up steadily when they were halfway down the mountain and, according to Mr Schoolfield, a flash flood warning popped up on his phone three hours after they became stranded.

On Sept 19, the rain was moving out of Southern California but was expected to continue through the day over the Sierra Nevada and the south-western United States. Parts of Central California, especially around the burn scars left by the Borel fire in 2024 and the Garnet fire in 2025, were under flood watches on the afternoon and evening of Sept 19, forecasters said.

Monitoring stations near the worst of flooding reported that more than 2.5cm of rain fell in just over an hour on the afternoon of Sept 18.

One in Oak Glen reported that 4.5cm of rain fell between 1.45pm and 2.45pm on the afternoon of Sept 18. In Seven Oaks, 2.5cm was reported between 2pm and 3pm.

Desert areas to the south-east of the San Bernardino National Forest reported powerful wind gusts as high as 102kmh, and a rain gauge in Borrego Springs reported that 1.75cm fell in just an hour on the afternoon of Sept 18.

The rugged and idyllic communities of the San Bernardino mountains are often at risk of natural disasters. In 2023, heavy rains from Tropical Storm Hilary caused flooding and fast-moving mudslides that swept away homes, including one that a 75-year-old woman could not escape in time. In March 2023, 13 people died after they were trapped by snowstorms. NYTIMES