The Butte County Sheriff announced a mandatory evacuation for Butte, Yuba and Sutter County residents because an imminent failure warning was issued for the Emergency Spillway at the Oroville Dam Sunday.

Shortly after 4:20 p.m., thousands of people began packing up their things and started migrating north and west of the affected area.

At least 130,000 people have been evacuated, according to the California Office of Emergency Services.

People began arriving at the Silver Dollar Fairgrounds, the main evacuation area in Chico.

Alisa Logan with her husband Brandon, and sons Jacob and Kyle were there to meet them.

“We just went shopping at Costo and bought a bunch of cases of water and figured we would bring them there and see if there anything we could do to help out,” Logan said. “We made a donation station because they (those in charge) had not done that yet.”

Food, diapers, bath products and blankets were all welcomed at the donation station.

At 6:30 p.m., the American Red Cross arrived with supplies and helped organize the shelter. Businesses such as Round Table, Starbucks and Little Caesar’s Pizza made donations of pizza and coffee.

“I was there for the one in ’98. They did not open the Spillways then and I was living downtown.” said Roger Jones, a resident of Oroville for nearly 30 years. “They said we had to go and we had to go.”

George Johnston can be reached at [email protected] or @gjohnston786 on Twitter.