Millions remain in the dark
Thousands did not have power restored from weekend shutoff
Hours after restoring power to some of the 960,000 customers affected by the public safety power shutoff over the weekend, PG&E pulled the plug again Tuesday amid high winds and low humidity — in some cases not giving affected customers a break between outages.
Customers in Butte, Plumas, Tehama, Trinity and Shasta counties started to lose power at 4 a.m, the utility said — the first of about 596,000 customers across 29 counties scheduled to be affected Tuesday. In the Bay Area, Marin, Napa and Solano counties saw shutoffs starting at 7 a.m., and five more counties were expected to lose power late Tuesday beginning at 11 p.m.
Customers who lose power also will have to cope with near-freezing temperatures forecast for the Bay Area this week.
“We’ll just have to use thick blankets,” said Brittaney Nasers, of Vallejo, who on Tuesday morning went to PG&E’s Community Resource Center at the Solano County Fairgrounds in Vallejo. The power at her house has been out since Saturday night, and now parts of the city are under a second round of shutoffs. Nasers was at the center to charge her devices because the generator she was using had just run out of gas.
“We’ve spent $150 so far on gas” for the generator, she said. “It’s getting pricey.” She noted that several gas stations in the area are closed.
The shutoffs were expected to last until midday Wednesday, PG&E said. Affected regions span the Northern and Southern Sierras,
North Bay and Bay Area, Santa Cruz mountains, North Coast and Kern County.
About 57 percent, or 556,400, of the customers affected in the Oct. 26 shutoff had power back by the time the fresh wave of shutoffs began Tuesday morning, PG&E said.
But thousands of customers’ service will not be or were not restored before the next round of shutoffs. The utility cited more than 50 weather-related damages to its equipment that occurred during the high winds of the latest power shutoff, meaning that it could take longer to inspect and secure lines.
That’s why the PG&E center — one of several dozen the utility is running in affected areas — came in handy for Alex of Vallejo, who declined to give his last name. After a couple of days with no power at his house, he said he was grateful for a place to charge his phone.
The center also was handing out free flashlights, solarpowered lanterns and two bags of ice to take home. While at the center charging their devices or using WiFi to get online, they were offered bottled water and coffee.
“(PG&E) is trying their best,” he said. “I’m trying to put myself in their shoes. You can’t control nature.”
Hamilton Erridge, a PG&E IT employee who volunteered to staff the center in Vallejo, said that as of right before noon Tuesday, about 310 adults and 30 kids had come through — a rate of about 100 people an hour since the center opened at 8 a.m.
“They’re disheveled, tired and sometimes just want someone to vent to,” Erridge said. “And that’s fine.”
In nearby American Canyon,
a small city south of Napa, city staff were running a device-charging center Tuesday, thanks to Napa County, which provided the generators and supplies. American Canyon residents lost power Saturday night, and — like some of their Vallejo neighbors — were affected by a second round of shutdowns without having had their power restored in between.
Creighton Wright, director of the city’s parks and recreation department, said he was talking with PG&E about setting up a Community Resource Center there. In the meantime, the 200 or so residents who came to the community center were given an hour to charge their devices.
Tuesday’s shutoffs marked the fourth major public safety power shutoff this month as harsh winds grip the region, leading to increased fire danger and the possibility of rapidly spreading fire.