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The USGS landslide team monitors and continues to update the hazard map models based on data collected in burn areas. This information improves future models and provides better hazard assessments used by officials for emergency response and decision making. Many of the steep hillsides burned and denuded in California fires repel water rather than soak it in.

California's Highway 1 snakes its way along the steep terrain of the Big Sur coast. The bridge over Villa Creek can be seen in the left of the photo, as well as a retaining wall built under the freeway towards the center. These are just a few of the engineering feats by Caltrans to keep the roadway intact.

A two-day rainstorm from January 26-28, 2021 caused numerous mudslides, debris flows, and other issues along California's coastal Highway 1 through Big Sur. This section is just north of Kirk Creek, at a drainage where mud was washed across the roadway. Plumes of the muddy runoff are clearly visible in the ocean.

A two-day rainstorm from January 26-28, 2021 caused numerous mudslides, debris flows, and other issues along California's coastal Highway 1 through Big Sur. This section is just north of Wild Cattle Creek. Mud washed across the roadway from the cliffs in numerous locations along the 70+-mile stretch of this scenic coastal road.

A section of Highway 1 along the California coast in Big Sur with more examples of the numerous debris flows and mudslides that occur following a heavy rain. This section is just south of the Rat Creek debris flow that completely washed out a large chunk of the highway.

The atmospheric river, a narrow, powerful track of water vapor that can deliver tremendous volumes of rain, hit the central California coast and stalled there between January 26 and 28, 2021 — with catastrophic consequences.