1938 Los Angeles Flood

The Los Angeles Flood of 1938 as it was reported in London by Gaumont News.

This flood was one of the largest and deadliest in Los Angeles history. It killed 113 people and destroyed 5,601 homes and businesses, while causing catastrophic damage to 1,500 other properties. In total, the damage was estimated to have cost $78 million, which would equal about $1.7 billion today.

For Los Angeles, this was the fourth major flood in five years, and was by far the worst, submerging 108,000 acres of land across the county. This led the state to bring in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to channelize the Los Angeles River, putting it into what they described at the time to be “a concrete straitjacket” so that water could better drain from the Los Angeles Basin.

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