Oprah Winfrey's home was among the many damaged by the Southern California flash floods and mudslides that resulted in at least a dozen fatalities.
The former talk-show host, whose Golden Globes speech spurred chatter about a 2020 run, shared a video montage to her Instagram account depicting damage done to her 65-acre Santa Barbara County property, People magazine reported.
“What a day! Praying for our community again in Santa Barbara,” Winfrey wrote in the caption, noting that helicopters had to rescue her neighbors and were looking for missing persons.
Footage showed a fire caused by a gas leak in the downpour as well as Winfrey’s mud covered backyard, which she waded through in rain boots, People noted.
“The house in back is gone,” Winfrey noted at one point in the clip, according to The Huffington Post.
Winfrey bought the property in 2001 in Montecito, which is also home to celebrities including Rob Lowe and Ellen DeGeneres, who also tweeted about the floods.
While the storm may be over, the work only now beings for authorities in Santa Barbara County, who are working to find dead, injured and trapped people in the wake of the powerful mud flow, Time reported.
The body count as of Wednesday was 15, with 25 reported injured and 50 having to be rescued. The numbers are expected to rise as the search continued.
“Right now our assets are focused on determining if anyone is still alive in any of those structures that have been damaged,” Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said, according to Time.
“At least several dozen homes that have been either destroyed or severely damaged, and likely many other ones are in areas that are as-yet inaccessible.”
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.