California’s former Governator terminated a pothole that has plagued his ritzy neighborhood for weeks, after a spate of wild winter weather tore up Southern California streets.
Arnold Schwarzenegger shared a video of himself and a crew of men fixing a sizeable gap in the street near his 15,000 square foot Bel Air mansion on Tuesday.
In the clip, which racked up more than ten million views, the Terminator star was filmed pouring bags of Quikcrete into a shallow hole that was several feet long.
“Today, after the whole neighborhood has been upset about this giant pothole that’s been screwing up cars and bicycles for weeks, I went out with my team and fixed it,” he captioned the post.
“I always say, let’s not complain, let’s do something about it. Here you go.”
A neighbor in a white Mercedes pulled over while he was smoothing the asphalt into the hole to express her gratitude.
“You’re welcome,” he remarked. “You have to do it yourself. This is crazy. For three weeks I’ve been waiting for this hole to be closed.”
Southern California has been pummeled with an unprecedented amount of atmospheric rivers that have dumped rain onto the formerly drought stricken area since late December.
Los Angeles alone has received nearly two feet of rain since the beginning of the year, which at only four months month in, is already the 14th wettest in over 140 years.
While the excess of precipitation has ended water use restrictions for 7 million residents during the state’s historic drought, the heavy rain has caused mudslides, flooding, and even produced tornadoes.
An EF-1 twister tore through downtown Los Angeles in the late morning of March 23, ripping through the warehouse district for a half-mile before dissipating around three minutes later.
The tornado, which was the strongest one Los Angeles has had in 40 years, whipped through an industrial park at speeds of up to 110 MPH and significantly damaged 11 buildings.
It was the second tornado to hit LA County in a week, despite the area only ever reporting 10 funnel clouds in the last 23 years.
The county is so overwhelmed with road work due to the volatile weather, that Schwarzenegger decided not to wait for road workers to compete the task.
However, the Los Angeles Department of Public Works said fixing the pothole wasn’t actually their job, and told ABC7 that Southern California Gas Company was responsible for filling it.
SoCalGas said that the damaged asphalt was not a pot hole, but a service trench that was leftover from a pipeline upgrade to the area that was completed in January.
Temporary paving was patched over their work, until permanent concrete can be poured over the excavation site.
The company explained that the rain had delayed the paving process, which is typically completed a month after the project wraps up.
Regardless, Schwarzenegger’s actions clearly created a sense of urgency, as SoCalGas went out to level out and reinforce the patch a day after the video went viral.
They plan to put in permanent paving by the end of the week.
