At least 17 people have been killed by extreme mudslides in California - here's why the situation has gotten so deadly

Severe mudslides in Southern California have left 17 dead, and rescue crews still searching for at least 8 more people.

The mudslides came on the heels of one of the regions' worst spat of wildfires in recorded history, and the two cataclysms, like many processes on our planet, are related. Because the fires charred the landscape around the Montecito area, the lack of vegetation on the hills made them unstable as they got pounded with torrential rain.

Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown told reporters the scene looked like a "a World War One battlefield."

Mudslides can come suddenly, with little to-no-warning, but the genesis of these slides began in early December, with the largest wildfire in California's history.