Strong winds down trees, destroying homes and cars across Southern California

It was damaging winds hitting Southern California. Fox 11's Ed Lasco, Slotin Valley Village with a survey of the destruction left behind and the cleanup. Ed. And, Christine, the cleanup goes on this late hour. That whooshing sound from the Santa Ana is now being replaced by another sound, chainsaws, the sound of the cleanup. Have a look here. Crews have been moving in. They're trying to figure out how to chop this big pine down. Actually, it looks like it fell across the street here, right? But no, that's the huge branches of this tree because it's so enormous, the tree itself fell toward us. Along the sidewalk. And this is all happening in the last hour or so, so the trees are still falling down at this late hour. Watch. Cleanup crews move through the darkness, now dealing with this latest huge tree to come crashing down. It's a pine tree, a good 40-footer. It lets loose here on Lemp Ave, just off the 170. It snapped these power lines on the way down as dangerous, powerful winds blast through the Southland. And I hear a big sound, so I thought it was part of the wind behind my house or the side of my house. You know, like something was fell. Some of the wind gusts clocked at 55 miles per hour, ripping through the foothills and the San Fernando Valley, blowing down huge trees, blowing them down like they're toys. Trying to fall asleep. It was blowing the house. It felt like, you know, the dog was going crazy and everything, but we got wind pretty good up here. Santa Ana winds that carve out a damaging path here in Altadena. This tree crashes down right to the side of the house here. Its branch is almost as thick as its trunk, slamming the nearby cars, punching out windshields, other windows, and some of the cars even bent under the sheer weight of that tree. My wife yelled, hey, the tree went down, so I came outside. Came outside and saw this, a huge tree blown right over, even taking with it power lines. I heard the power go out. You know, I have battery backup units, and they all did the little poof. Others saying the falling tree sounded like bombs. Look at this damage, would you? In Pico Rivera, that is a monster eucalyptus tree. Neighbors say it's a good 40-footer, 50-footer maybe, crashing through the roof of this house on Rosemead Boulevard. One person inside hurt from all the flying debris, and yet another tree down, and even another close call here in Panorama City. This tree slamming into a medical transport van, trapping passengers inside. People were inside, elderly people, and they were stuck. They didn't know what to do. The driver was in shock. We had to rip the back off there to try to take a couple of them out, and then a few of them we got out of the side door. A daring rescue on what turned out to be a busy day and night for firefighters and utility crews as countless trees that have stood for years are standing no more. These pines are here for maybe over 100 years or so, so it's going to keep happening I think. Now live, I think so too, and that is the scary part of this, because think about it, the Santa Ana's here stopped blowing around 5 o'clock or so. It's been nice and calm, and then hours later, this huge pine lets loose, crashing down, so it doesn't seem like we're out of this yet, and this Santa Ana event, whew, really was a nasty one, I'll tell you. Meteorologist Jonathan Novak waiting for us, and Jonathan, I've got to hand it to you, you warned us, you told us this one was going to be nasty, nothing to fool around with. Well, I'll tell you Ed, folks, the ground is still draining from all the rain we've had the last couple of months, and so yeah, we're going to have continued trees toppling and landslides over the next months, and maybe even, I hate to say it, years, but look at some of the numbers from today, Marshall Peaks, San Bernardino County Mountains had winds near 90 miles per hour, Rancho Cucamonga 81, Simi Valley 71, it was a near 60 mile per hour wind gust to Huntington Beach earlier. Tonight, the winds have come down, but it's still pretty gusty, there are wind advisories that are in still effect for LA County West, but thankfully, at least, the high wind warnings have been canceled, they've been dropped, allowed to expire, however you want to say it, for the eastern counties, so we could still see some gusts upwards of 55, and this goes until 11 a.m. tomorrow, but while we're talking about the winds, look what else is in effect now, winter weather advisories for the mountains of San Bernardino Riverside counties, I told you, after the winds subside, what happens, the rain and the snow, as we see moisture wrapping around this low pressure area, so that has already begun, snow being reported by both on the ground and on the radar scope, quick look at the winds showing that they back off going into the morning time tomorrow, 6 a.m., still a pretty breezy day, but thankfully, the worst is over there, check out the rain and the wind and the snow, you can see the snow continuing tomorrow, but I'm going to tell you that rain chance will spread east, or westward, into the rest of the area, details on that, coming up in the 70 Outlook in a few minutes, Alex. Alright, Jonathan, look at this video, the Antelope Valley, the winds creating a scene that looks like an older western movie, all this tumbleweed and dust along the 50th street in the Palmdale area.