It’s routine for Rachel Lee to take West 17th Avenue to work every morning. But Monday she didn’t expect to have to swim out of her Nissan Maxima as floodwater swamped the interior.
“Within a minute the water was up to my windows almost,” Lee, 28, said.
Torrential morning rains caught drivers like Lee off guard throughout metro Denver on Monday, as water quickly washed over streets and paths, creating traffic problems and closing roadways.
Lee’s car and two others stalled in deep water on the south side of Sloan’s Lake. All three vehicles were towed or pushed to dryer ground.
“It’s a mini tragedy,” Lee said, certain that a library book — and perhaps her car’s entire electrical system — were lost in the flooding.
Kyle Fredin, meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Boulder, said storms were confined mostly to northwest Denver, with some areas receiving as much as 2.2 inches of rain from the morning shower.
Tuesday’s forecast promises relief from the string of stormy days that broke the heat spell on Friday.
“We’re going to dry out,” Fredin said, predicting sunny skies for Tuesday and Wednesday with highs in the mid-80s and 90s respectively.
Farther north, rain hit the 87,284-acre High Park fire burn zone hard. Heavy rainfall creates particular problems for fire-scarred landscapes where the open grounds and fire-baked soil provide the perfect conditions for rapid runoff.
Early Monday, the third mudslide since Friday shut down Colorado 14 just west of Ted’s Place. Colorado Department of Transportation spokeswoman Ashley Mohr said crews removed 400 tons of rock — including what had accumulated over the weekend — before reopening the road.
“Those poor folks up there can’t win right now,” she said. “First they get the fire, then they get the aftermath.”
CDOT closed U.S. 24 indefinitely north of Leadville after reports came in of a 20-by-30- foot sinkhole that measured in at 45 feet deep.
Geologists are assessing the sinkhole, she said.
“It’s been a problem area for some time,” Mohr said. “This was just the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
John Schulz, Larimer County Sheriff’s Office spokesman, said the 227 pre-evacuation notices issued Friday remain in place for residents on Colorado 14 from Mishawaka to Gateway Park because of flash-flood concerns.
Makoto Moore, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Pueblo, said the eastern sections of the Waldo Canyon fire burn zone in Colorado Springs received 0.5 to 0.75 inches of rain, but there were no official reports of flooding.
Tegan Hanlon: 303-954-1729, thanlon@denverpost.com
