SAN DIEGO — City and county leaders Monday thanked San Diegans for taking precautions and staying at home during Tropical Storm Hilary as crews continue to assess damages caused by the storm.
The region saw no loss of life caused by the weather, the leaders said Monday.
San Diego Gas & Electric reported a total of 15,000 customers lost power -- the vast majority of which have had power restored. City and county crews are still assessing sinkholes and infrastructure damage, but ultimately it appears disaster was averted. Crews were also assessing downed trees. One area that saw downed trees was near La Jolla Colony Drive in University City, where clean-up crews Monday began removing two large trees that toppled over during the storm.
One of the trees, which was approximately 40 to 50 feet in height, crashed on top of the roof of two townhomes Sunday around 5:30 p.m. It happened at the Madrid La Jolla Colony complex.
"There was a tremendous gust of wind, we waited for a couple of minutes, and then this enormous crash occurred," said resident Dennis Verilli, who also said you could tell by the sound of the crash, something had hit a structure.
According to neighbors, fire crews were on the scene within minutes and they made sure all three residents made it out safely. Fortunately, no one was hurt.
A second tree was spotted along La Jolla Colony Drive Monday morning. It did not hit anything. By mid-day, crews had already started removing it.
Meanwhile, the region's emergency shelter bed usage was 72%, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said. Some unsheltered people in the cities and unincorporated areas declined the offer of shelter when organizations reached out to them -- 13 of those people had to be rescued by San Diego Fire-Rescue Department swift water crews from a flooded encampment in Mission Valley.
"Because of their work, the worst that we feared never came to pass," Gloria said.
He thanked the diligent city employees, but also decried the city's infrastructure as insufficient and reiterated his administration's commitment to stormwater and street improvements.
Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a State of Emergency on Saturday, with San Diego city and county officials doing the same. Newsom met with Gloria on Saturday at the San Diego Emergency Operations Center to discuss emergency preparations.
County crews ultimately distributed more than 100,000 sandbags at central locations throughout the county's municipalities and received a shipment of 100,000 more from the state before the storm hit.
"Today we focus on assessing damages," said Jeff Toney, director of the county's emergency services department. "This assessment will continue over the next several days.
Eric Dargan, San Diego's chief operating officer, said the city was able to evacuate people experiencing homelessness from its 20th and B shelter to the second floor of Golden Hall -- which only two weeks ago was the shelter for families before they were moved to a different shelter in Barrio Logan. They will be relocated to the 20th and B shelter as soon as it is deemed safe, Dargan said.
Additionally, the city released water from three of its reservoirs during the storm, at Barrett, El Capitan and Hodges.
Dargan warned residents to be on the lookout for backed-up storm drains and that "potholes will happen."
Watch Related After the storm | San Diego deals with some flooding and at least one swift water rescue