More outages to start Sunday
Fire-weary Northern California faces the most dangerous wind conditions of the year
More than 466,000 PG&E customers in 38 counties will experience power shutoffs between Sunday and Tuesday night as the Bay Area and most of Northern California endure the most dangerous fire weather conditions of the year this weekend, with strong winds up to 70 mph in the hills and single- digit humidity.
So- called “Diablo winds” roaring in from Nevada and blowing toward the ocean are expected to begin Sunday evening, peaking late Sunday night into Monday morning. The National Weather Service says conditions will be similar to 2017, when the Wine Country fires devastated the North Bay.
Forecasters say the winds could bring down trees and power lines and cause widespread outages, even at lower elevations, where gusts could reach 50 mph in some areas.
“People shouldn’t do anything with open flames outdoors,” said David King, a meteorologist with the weather service in Monterey. “They might want to bring in outdoor patio furniture and make sure they have batteries for power outages. And people should make sure their phone is charged and they have a ‘go bag’ ready in case there is a fire.”
Warning of “critical to extreme fire weather conditions,” the weather service on Friday afternoon issued a red flag warning for all nine Bay Area counties and Santa Cruz County. In the North Bay hills, East Bay hills and Diablo Range, it runs from Sunday at 11 a.m. through Tuesday at 11 a.m., while along the coast, in the Santa Cruz Mountains and in lower elevations around the Bay Area, it has a narrower window, beginning at 8 p.m. Sunday and ending at 11 a.m. Tuesday.
PG&E announced late Friday that 466,086 customers in 38 counties will have their power shut off starting at various times Sunday, with many losing electricity until Tuesday. The outages are
a preemptive measure that utilities in California have taken in recent years to reduce the risk of wildfires starting from downed, energized power lines during very windy, dry fall weather.
In the Bay Area, 39,401 customers will be shut off in Alameda County, 20,148 in Contra Costa County, 19,676 in Marin County, 15,598 in Napa County, 4,458 in San Mateo County, 4,470 in Santa Clara County, 1,606 in Solano County and 38,119 in Sonoma County. Also, 14,317 customers will be turned off in Santa Cruz County, mostly in the mountains. For information, go to pgealerts.alerts. pge.com/updates.
These are the most extensive shutoffs of 2020, although the utility has regularly cut power in response to wind forecasts since it initiated the policy two years ago.
Meanwhile, the East Bay Regional Park District announced it will close 11 parks in the East Bay hills on Sunday and Monday due to fire danger, including Chabot, Tilden and Redwood.
Unlike previous wind events this year, this one is expected to affect not only hills and mountaintops but also valleys and towns around the Bay Area, with winds from the north at 25 to 35 mph, gusting as high as 50 mph at lower elevations, forecasters said.
After a record fire season in which 4.1 million acres have burned statewide — twice the previous record from 2018 — Californians are weary of fire and ready for the danger to be over.
But fire experts reminded them that October is historically the most dangerous month for fire risk in the state. That’s partly because of the wind patterns, but also because by October, it usually has been six months since the last significant rainfall, and moisture levels in grasses, shrubs and trees are very low.
The last significant rain in the Bay Area came on April 6.
“On a scale of 1 to 10, this event is a 9,” said Craig Clements, director of San Jose State University’s Fire Weather Lab. “Historically our biggest fires are in October. We are in a critical period. And these are the strongest winds of the year. It was 29 years ago this week that the Oakland Hills fire happened.”
Eight of California’s 10 deadliest fires have occurred in October or November, from the Camp Fire that killed 85 people in the town of Paradise in 2018 to the Wine Country fires in Napa and Sonoma counties in 2017 that killed 44, to the Oakland Hills Fire in 1991, where 25 people died.
Similarly, six of the 10 most destructive fires in California history, measured by the number of homes burned, came in October or November.
Cal Fire, the state’s primary firefighting agency, is working with fire departments in high-risk areas to pre-position equipment so any fires that start can be immediately attacked, said Cal Fire spokesman Daniel Berlant. “These conditions we haven’t seen this year,” Berlant said. “These are the same conditions we saw in the 2017 North Bay fires. We are definitely bracing for some very strong winds.”
Similar winds in Southern California, called Santa Ana winds, are forecast Sunday through Tuesday, raising fire risk there. There are also red flag warnings across much of the rest of Northern California from Sunday to Tuesday, including Modesto, Stockton, Sacramento, Redding and the Sierra.
Fire experts urge residents to closely follow the forecast. The good news: Temperatures are expected to be modest through next week, with highs in the 70s across most of the Bay Area.
“The unfortunate part is as of right now, at least through the end of October, we aren’t seeing any precipitation,” King said, “and probably none through the first week in November.”
“Everyone is ready for fire season to be done,” he added. “But right now the only thing we can hope for is to get through this event and for the winds to shift direction next week.”