Part of Highway 9 closed for almost 19 hours

Chris Mayo left his home in Boulder Creek Wednesday morning around 10 to get to Grocery Outlet in Watsonville.

“It took us three hours which is normally an hour and 15 minute drive,” Mayo said.

The reason? Trees took down power lines overnight. The trees were cleared but the power lines looked more like zip lines across Highway 9 between Mitchell and Teihl drives Wednesday afternoon.

Mayo returned at 1:30 Wednesday afternoon only to find the road was still closed.

“Well I’m not very happy about it ,” he said. “They’re working on one side of the street, they could open the other side of the street and let people through, especially handicapped people.”

The 56-year-old man said he’s got back problems, bad lungs and a bad heart.

‘”I can only walk 50 or 100 feet at a time and I gotta sit down and rest,” Mayo said.

But walking for a lot of people like Mayo was the only option.

Trees were falling all over the place Wednesday morning in the Santa Cruz mountains even though it hadn’t rained for a few days.

One in Brookdale and another in Paradise Park. California Highway Patrol officers say they see trees start to fall when the ground gets saturated.

With power lines draped across the highway, Pacific Gas & Electric said it worked to restore power to a number of homes.

Comcast and AT&T were there as well.

Highway 9 opened back up at 8 Wednesday night.