An estimated 1 inch to 1.5 inches of rain soaked the Silver Fire burn area in Poppet Flats on Friday afternoon, unleashing flows of black mud and debris as well as rocks in places on Highway 243.
The black flows swept down Poppet Creek, covered a property east of Park Drive with several feet of water and mud, left quicksand-soft muck surrounding a trailer home, and also caused mud and water damage in the Silent Valley RV Camp to canopies, tables and blankets outside about 110 camper homes, according to Cal Fire.
Cliff Jackson's home on Keyes Drive in Poppet Flats survived the Silver Fire, and he came out during the storm to try to keep a neighbor's drain clear and then shovel a clear path for her to get in and out of her trailer.
Rich Wood came from the San Francisco area to visit his mom at her place next to Poppet Creek, below the Silver Fire burn area. He witnessed the dry drainage
fill with the slow-moving front end of a debris flow mixed with ash, leave and mud before it turned to a fast-moving channel of water.
Wood said the road outside his mom's place, Cryer Drive, was four to five feet under water at its lowest spot, making it completely impassable for a time.
The forecast for Saturday in the mountains on both sides of the San Gorgonio Pass, including the Silver Fire and Mountain Fire burns, calls for scattered showers and possible thunderstorms with locally heavy rain, National Weather Service meteorologist Jimmy Taeger said in a phone interview Friday night.
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