haven't seen the bright and sunny skies for a while, and that's not going to last for much longer. there is more rain on the way. take a live look outside as we see that sunshine over the city. good afternoon, i'm karina nova. we want to

start with the forecast, and abc seven news meteorologist drew tuma has the timing on. you've guessed it. more rain. >> we did have torrential rain yesterday. here's a look at the rainfall totals. the north bay, 3 to 6in of rain and a lot of areas in the city. three inches. oakland saw two inches and even the south bay. the rain took its time getting to you, but by yesterday afternoon you really had some heavy rain in most areas in the south bay. picked up more than an inch of rain. so we do get a break today from the storms, but more rain is on the way tomorrow. here's a look at the accuweather headlines. it's our first headline bright and brisk today. sunny, but temperatures are on the cooler side for this time of the year. we'll have daytime highs in the mid 50s now. tomorrow our stormy weather is back. rain and also wind. it's level two, a moderate storm and then the weekend. weekend is looking really nice sunshine. but we do have some chilly mornings. it is cool. that's the headline, but it is a nice looking day. a lot of sunshine. temperatures in the mid 50s for most of us today. now tonight we'll find clouds on the increase. we do remain dry.

the rain is really going to hold off until after 6 a.m. tomorrow morning, so overnight it will be quiet with some chilly temperatures. but tomorrow we do have the storm impact scale. it's a level two, a moderate storm for rain. heaviest rain will be in the afternoon. the strongest winds will be in the evening, and because our ground is already pretty saturated with this rain coming our way, it is a good chance we'll see some minor flooding. so looking at your thursday, the morning commute looks pretty quiet. the tail end of it. we start to see that rain move in here, but once that rain arrives after 8 or 9 a.m, it's with us all day long. it's the afternoon, the evening commute that will be messier on our thursday. and that's when we could see some downpours and those winds strengthening. so rainfall totals as we head throughout the day tomorrow and into early friday, most of us will likely see about a half of an inch to an inch of rain, where we do see those downpours set up, we could quickly exceed an inch of rain and that could cause some minor flooding. we'll watch that very closely. watching our winds too. it's going to be another windy evening. winds 20 to 50mph, closer to 55 60mph along the

coast. so we could have some more trees come down tomorrow evening. winter storm watch around tahoe. we have more snow coming our way. most of this falls late tomorrow night and throughout the day on friday. so we're saying if you can get to tahoe by about noon tomorrow, you should be just fine. don't try and go tomorrow night or even on friday as the heavy snow falls. it does clear out in time for a really nice weekend saturday and sunday. here's the accuweather seven day forecast. then we have that wet and windy weather coming back here tomorrow. drier skies finally prevail here friday afternoon and that sets the stage for a sunny weekend. and we'll keep those dry conditions into monday and tuesday. >> drew thank you. in the north bay the storm damage is adding up. flood water is still an issue. and take a look at this. a large landslide damaged a multi-million dollar home. this is on deer trail road in santa rosa, and we just spoke to the homeowners who tell us they lost their home in the tubbs fire and rebuilt it just to lose it again

in a landslide. abc seven news reporter tim johns has the emotional interview coming up at 4:00. and that slide happened just a day after a home slid into the russian river. dramatic video shows remnants of the home floating in the water. a landslide was to blame for this damage to. fortunately, the house was empty and no one was hurt. first responders evacuated people from several neighboring homes as a precaution. meanwhile, flooding forced crews to evacuate a medical center in santa rosa. >> it didn't actually look that deep. it looked like very wide, but not super deep. and then i drove, and as soon as i hit the water, i realized it was a mistake. wow. >> and the car just shut off. then at that point. >> yep. so probably need probably shot my engine, so that's good. >> it's the second time in three months a swollen creek flooded the parking lot outside the sutter health on airway drive. >> just overflowing everywhere. it's crazy how much rain we have

had today. >> also, in the north bay, the napa river is overflowing its banks in calistoga. the city of napa closed the mckenzie street flood gates to reduce the risk of homes. in saint helena, the napa river tipped into a minor flood stage and seeped into some nearby houses there. in san francisco, part of sansome street is blocked off by debris from a mudslide in the telegraph hill area today. an engineer was on the scene to make sure the site was secure. abc seven news reporter lena howland has a look at the extent of that damage. >> reporter as san francisco was pounded with rain tuesday, a mudslide came down telegraph hill around 6:00 tuesday night, crashing through the retaining wall and fencing spilling out onto samson street. >> there are some cracks in the rocks on the hillside. it brought the rock down that already was loose, and so we wanted to make sure it was safe. >> san francisco public works

says about 400yd■!t of rock slid down the telegraph hillside. specialized engineers were out inspecting the area tuesday night and wednesday morning, making sure the houses at the top of the hill were safe. >> there's no risk at this point of them coming down. so that's the number one thing we wanted to make sure would be happening. >> no one was hurt and no cars in the area were damaged. >> it looks pretty precarious. so the amount of rain we got, it's not surprising. there was an area, an issue here. >> by morning, it was the talk of the neighborhood, with people like kevin dietrich stopping to snap a photo on his walk to work. >> i definitely wouldn't park here. seeing this, i think i would steer clear and let the let the folks take care of it. >> with more rain on the way in the coming days, public works says they plan to keep a close watch on this area. >> we're going to be out here regularly now through this rainy season, and make sure that this hillside has remained stable and safe. and if it doesn't, we're going to do whatever we can to keep the people safe and keep them away from this.

>> the city has been able to keep one lane of traffic open here on samson street. we're told crews will be out here later today working to start the process of cleaning this up, though no word yet on how long that might take. in san francisco, lena howland, abc seven news. >> lena. thank you. power is slowly coming back on after tuesday's storm caused outages across the bay area. there are currently about 2100 customers without electricity. that's down from about 4400 customers this morning. p-g-and-e's real time outage map shows a spattering of outages. there are no major outages right now, so that's good. and you can track the next storm with the abc seven bay area app. it gives you access to the same live doppler seven that our weather team uses. will also send alerts with important weather updates. building a better bay area focuses now on public safety, with a look at a new plan in san francisco to deal with the drug market in the sixth street corridor, the city is creating an outdoor triage center where officers will

direct drug users and dealers to treatment or jail. the triage center will be set up in a parking lot on stephenson street, near market and sixth. according to the standards report, the city will have a jail transport van ready to bus. those who are arrested to jail or to take them to get clean. the hope is that doing this will free up beat cops to respond to other things. a win for san francisco mayor daniel lurie in his fight to tackle the fentanyl crisis. supervisors approved his plan to override the usual checks and balances to get this done. he plans to add 1500 beds for shelters, open a 24 hour drop off crisis center, and hire more safety professionals. lurie also wanted to allow private entities to fund these endeavors, and he can now accept donations of up to $10 million without supervisor approval. the chronicle reported that supervisors approved the measure for a period of one year. at that point, they will review how successful the program is. now,

the latest on elon musk's role on capitol hill. protesters gathered in several states today in opposition of musk's influence and to urge democratic lawmakers to fight the department of government efficiencies, broad access to government systems. abc news reporter lionel moise has a look at doj's latest demands. dismantling of a government organization. >> the cia is now offering buyouts to its entire staff. the latest move in president trump's push to downsize the government. it follows a similar offer to civilian federal workers last month. about 20,000 of those workers have now accepted the buyout. ahead of tomorrow's deadline, amid reports of mass layoffs to come. abc news has learned elon musk, leading the department of government efficiency, has now moved beds into the executive office building next to the white house, allowing musk and his staff to sleep there when working late. his staff reportedly includes people as young as 19 years old. president

trump insists they're qualified. >> they're very smart people. >> trump also praising musk for dismantling usaid, an agency that funds international relief efforts. >> it's a disaster. >> usaid staff getting this email that all direct hires will be put on administrative leave with pay, except for certain staffers serving mission critical functions. democrats held a rally outside the treasury department to protest musk's. influence. >> we are at war. we have got to tell elon musk nobody elected your. nobody told you you could get all of our private information. we don't we. >> don't pledge allegiance to elon musk. we pledge allegiance to the united states of america. >> yes. >> musk has also faced scrutiny after getting ahold of the treasury department's payment system, which disperses 90% of all federal payments, including

social security and medicare. the treasury department insisting musk's team has been granted read only access, suggesting no changes will be made without higher authority. and back to those buyout offers made to millions of federal workers. three unions are now suing to block the offers, arguing the buyout plan amounts to a threat and represents an arbitrary offer. lionel moise, abc news, new york. >> 2.2 billion gallons of water flowed out of california reservoirs because of trump's order to open dams, but now some are saying that water was wasted. a closer look a

flu cases in california are on the rise. test positivity for the flu is at levels not seen in several years. according to the state's most recent surveillance data, the rate of infections is on the rise. so why are we seeing this in california and across the country? plus, what do we need to know about the bird flu and eating eggs? we're getting some answers from ucsf infectious disease specialist doctor peter chin hong. thank you so much for being here. >> thanks for having me here, karina. >> let's start with the flu. i feel like we know everyone around us is sick. somebody knows somebody, or you yourself might have been sick. are these infection rates alarming to you? >> they're not alarming. they're still in the realm of the spectrum of where flu can go. so every year we can have anywhere between 35 and above 50,000 deaths, unfortunately. so it falls in that spectrum. the

reason why it feels so acute, particularly in the bay area and in california, is that we're going on our curve later than the rest of the country, and it seems that, you know, we're kind of in the middle of it. it's still actually going up. so it's no mistake that a lot of people, you know, with the sniffles don't have the cold. they have the flu. >> that's interesting. that's good to know. and why are people getting the flu now more than the last few years? >> well, there are several possibilities. the first is that this year we have a type of flu. it's still included in the vaccine called h3n2. that's a little bit more likely to cause symptoms and to cause people to get more ill. the second reason is that we actually don't have a lot of covid right now. so, you know, evolutionarily speaking, evolutionarily speaking, there's less viral interference. so it

the landscape kind of gets caught up by one kind of organism. and that's flu right now. and there are other reasons too, that have to do with the efficacy of the vaccine, whether people have gotten the vaccine. and of course, you know, it coming a little bit later in general in the country this year. >> so any advice for any of us when you get that first sign of getting the flu, you don't feel well. does anything shorten the illness? >> that's a great question. you know, i think hydration is going to be key. i think if you get diagnosed early enough, you can shave off one day of illness by taking tamiflu or oseltamivir. of course, for the very young and the very old, that can keep those populations away from the hospital. but you need to be diagnosed early, like within 48 hours for that to work. i think a lot of people also don't know that if you're, you know, you get the flu, but you live with very young or very old people, even if they don't have the flu. there is guidance for giving them medications so they they

don't get the flu. so i think those are some of the things apart from washing hands, you know, ventilation that are going to be important. >> okay. let's move on to the bird flu. what is the latest status on the bird flu cases in california and nationally? >> so california continues to be where most of the cases occur, about 38 out of the 67 cases around the country. and so far as people might realize, most of these come from dairy workers in other states, some poultry workers as well. but there have been two cases one in alameda, one in san francisco, where they were detected in children without any obvious risk factors. but the way you can also look at that is that it's not a lot of people, because it's still very hard for that bird flu to get inside our human bodies. >> there is some breaking news on the avian flu, with reports that cows in nevada have been infected with a second form of the virus. what do you know

about that? what can you tell us? >> yeah. so right now there are two kind of flavors of bird flu. there's one that's in our dairy workers and that's, you know, not causing a lot of serious illness. but there's another one called d1 that was in a teenager in bc, was in that patient in louisiana who was also older with comorbidities, who passed away, unfortunately. and that strain has been detected for the first time in a dairy cow. and because it's been transmitted so rapidly amongst cows, the worry is that that new strain that caused people to get sicker when they got it might be more easily transmitted. >> now, this has brought up an interesting question from people. people are asking, is it safe to eat eggs during a bird flu outbreak? and are some eggs safer than others? can you weigh in on this? >> yeah. so it's still safe to

eat eggs. i ate eggs this morning for breakfast, but i think there are a few caveats. first of all, cooked eggs are going to be better than raw eggs. but raw eggs are still relatively safe right now because, you know, before you get the eggs in the carton, it's been disinfected, it's been cleaned. and the biggest point is that when chickens get bird flu, they die very, very quickly. so they can't make eggs. so you're not going to get infected eggs as opposed to cow's milk, because the cows don't do as poorly. they just make infected milk or milk not so high in quality. so but the eggs are not able to be made because those birds have gotten really, really sick in a very rapid fashion. so that's the biggest reason why eggs are generally safer than raw milk, for example. >> okay, a lot of good information there. thank you so much for weighing in today, doctor peter chin-hong. we'll see you back here soon.

>> thanks so much,

donald trump today in washington, d.c. it's a push to get more federal money for victims of the l.a. county wildfires. it will be a closed door meeting, and newsom is the first democrat to sit down with the president in the white house since the inauguration. trump has blamed california's leaders for the fires and threatened to withhold aid if the state doesn't change its water and voter id policies. newsom arrived in the nation's capital yesterday to hold separate talks with lawmakers. he's scheduled to return to capitol hill tomorrow for additional meetings. critics say a trump administration plan designed to help victims of the los angeles wildfires and quench california's water crisis would be a waste. abc news reporter andrew dymburt explains there are growing questions about the plan's effectiveness. >> president trump recently signed an executive order

directing the army corps of engineers to release billions of gallons of water from two reservoirs. >> all we're doing is giving los angeles and the entire state of california virtually unlimited water. >> but many locals are slamming the move. one water master calling it alarming and scary. between last friday and sunday, 2.2 billion gallons of water were released from dams at lake cahuilla and lake success. many farmers are furious, saying it will leave them without enough water to irrigate later this year during the dry months. >> this is the time of year when we're trying to store water in our reservoirs for the very hot, dry summer that looks like it's coming. >> another issue the reservoirs are in california's central valley, far from the l.a. fire zone. >> it's literally physically impossible to get the water out of lake kaweah or terminus dam to l.a. >> but epa administrator lee zeldin defended trump's decision. >> president trump made his priorities clear. we want to make sure the water is flowing. we also want to make sure that

there is access to safe drinking water. >> california dreamin. dreamin. >> meanwhile, a financial boost for wildfire victims, organizers at the grammy awards and at last week's fire aid concert announcing the events raised a combined $125 million for relief efforts. andrew dymburt, abc news, new york. >> fury is a month for sales. we have expert advice on how to rack up some serious savings. that's next. and remember, abc seven news is streaming 24 over seven. you can get the abc seven bay area app and join us

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i'm reggie aqui. >> i'm liane melendez. >> i'm luz pena. i'm tara campbell. >> i'm j.r. >> stone at abc seven news. we deliver local stories. >> with real answers. >> to help make our city better. >> abc seven is the official broadcast partner of the 2025 san francisco chinese new year parade. you can watch the live parade saturday, february 15th starting at 6 p.m. catch all the excitement live on abc seven or wherever you stream. abc seven news. one of san francisco's cable car stations could become as memorable as the cars themselves. downtown boosters and city officials want to make the station on california street instagrammable by installing a new art sculpture. the sculpture would feature a heart bordered by the letter sf. officials also want to add signs that would inform visitors of the cable cars history and how to use the system. if you're single and looking to mingle this valentine's day, why not do it

on bart? the agency is hosting a speed dating event on february 14th that's being dubbed the valentine train. it's open to anyone 18 to 35, even people just looking for friends. the train will be depart the downtown berkeley station and ride to the 24th street station before returning to berkeley. there won't be any stops and riders will be busy with icebreakers, raffles, and bart themed valentine's. february is a month for love, football and shopping deals. abc news reporter, shopping shopping reporter jacqueline lee got tips from a shopping expert with what to buy this month. >> between the super bowl, valentine's day and presidents day, shoppers can expect plenty of deals this february. for football fans looking to upgrade their television set before the big game, you're in luck. >> the consumer electronics show is just in january, and so retailers are getting ready to show all the biggest and the brightest with all the bells and

whistles. >> if you're entertaining on game day, retailers will be offering discounts on football themed items, food platters and even some appliances like air fryers or electric grills. and don't forget to grab a gift for your sweetheart this valentine's day. there will be plenty of discounts on giftable items like jewelry, flowers, and candy. >> just be mindful. sometimes the prices are a little bit inflated and then discounted off of the inflated price, so make sure to shop around. >> for presidents day weekend. expect to see sales in the home category. >> this can be anything from small and large home appliances, mattresses, furniture you often don't see a lot of advance notice of the deals, and they tend to kick off on that friday right before presidents day. >> also, keep an eye out for clearance level discounts on winter outerwear and sports gear. as for what you should avoid. >> aside from tvs, the tech category for me is not very strong in february, so that's something i would wait on. unfortunately, the best deals in tech will pop up again in july,

but obviously right before mother's day and father's day you might see some activity. >> jacqueline lee, abc news, los angeles. >> and thank you for joining us. world news tonight with david muir starts now. tonight, the breaking news as we come on the air. bracing for a treacherous ice storm. multiple states. 100 million americans in the path. the warnings right now from the midwest right into the northeast. new york city to boston, washington, d.c., up to philadelphia. all could face a dangerous morning commute tomorrow. ginger zee standing by with the forecast. she'll time is