More than 800,000 subscribers in California will be left in the dark for days as the state's leading utility shuts off power to parts of 34 counties to reduce the risk of wildfires in dry and windy conditions.
Pacific Gas and Electric said blackouts across parts of northern, central and coastal California would start early Wednesday morning shortly after midnight in the largest preventive outage in state history.
Because every customer account could represent service to multiple residents or employees in a business, the number of people affected by the outages could be in the millions.
With winds between 40 mph and 70 mph expected Wednesday and Thursday, PG&E is trying to avoid downed power lines or contact with vegetation setting off fires. Some of California’s most destructive blazes in recent years were started by PG&E power lines.
Nearly all nine counties in the San Francisco Bay Area could be subjected to the shutdowns, the only exception being the city and county of San Francisco.
In addition, Southern California Edison said more than 100,000 customers could face power cuts in eight counties it serves, including more than 30,000 in Los Angeles County.
Michael Lewis, senior vice president of PG&E’s electric operations, said it could take “several days to fully restore power after the weather passes and safety inspections are completed.”
The beleaguered utility, which filed for bankruptcy earlier this year after a series of wildfires left it with billions of dollars in liabilities, further incurred its customers' wrath when its website crashed amid heavy traffic, preventing subscribers from finding information about the blackouts.
More at: https://news.yahoo.com/california-ut...150819926.html
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