Evacuees wait out uncertainty in Lake Oroville dam crisis: 'I'm just praying'

Local residents express a mix of frustration and stoicism as emergency crews race to stem flooding from America's tallest dam

A fleet of cars, pickup trucks and motor homes crept its way north in twilight, past rivers swollen with brown, muddy water, and away from America's tallest dam, where state officials desperately fought to keep the frothing waters from breaking through bulwarks and flooding into towns.

That was the dramatic scene on Sunday night. By late Monday afternoon, tens of thousands of people had relocated from the at-risk zone in northern California, 60 miles north of the state capital of Sacramento.