PG&E equipment triggered Zogg Fire
SACRAMENTO >> A PG&E transmission line’s contact with a tree triggered a deadly blaze in Shasta County last fall, state fire investigators announced Monday.
The Zogg Fire broke out in September 2020 in Shasta County and killed four people and caused one injury, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire.
“Cal Fire has determined that the Zogg Fire was caused by a pine tree contacting electrical distribution lines owned and operated by PG&E,” investigators said.
The Zogg Fire torched about 56,300 acres and destroyed 204 structures, according to Cal Fire.
The PG&E equipment that caused the fire is located near the Shasta County community of Igo.
“The loss of life and devastation in the communities impacted by the Zogg Fire is tragic, and we recognize that nothing can heal the hearts of those who have lost so much,” PG&E said Monday night in a prepared release.
We remain focused on continuing to reduce wildfire risk throughout our system and executing on the commitments made in our 2021 Wildfire Mitigation Plan. PG&E said it has fully cooperated with Cal Fire’s investigation.
“We remain focused on continuing to reduce wildfire risk throughout our system and executing on the commitments made in our 2021 Wildfire Mitigation Plan,” PG&E said.
Among the primary components of the PG&E wildfire mitigation plan: New electric grid technology, upgrades to the electricity system, heightened inspections of the electricity system, improved vegetation management, realtime monitoring.
San Francisco-based PG&E is attempting to bounce back from a decade of disasters ushered in by a 2010 explosion in San Bruno that killed eight and destroyed a neighborhood. In 2016, a federal jury convicted the utility of felonies it committed before and after the blast.
During the past decade, PG&E was found to have caused a string of catastrophic wildfires, including a deadly blaze in Amador and Calaveras counties in 2015, fatal infernos in the North Bay’s Wine Country and nearby regions in 2017, and a lethal conflagration in Butte County in 2018 that became California’s deadliest and most destructive wildfire.
In 2020, PG&E pleaded guilty to 84 counts of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the Camp Fire in Butte County.
The state Public Utilities Commission in 2020 levied a record-setting $1.94 billion penalty against PG&E for its role in the 2017 and 2018 infernos. That was the largest financial punishment ever imposed on an American public utility. It eclipsed the $1.6 billion financial penalty the PUC imposed on PG&E in 2015 for causing the San Bruno blast, at the time also a record-setting punishment.
PG&E last year emerged from a bankruptcy proceeding to reorganize its shattered finances, which buckled beneath a mountain of debts and wildfirerelated liabilities.