Sheriff: PG&E may cut power to Lake County for several days due to wind forecast
- Elizabeth Larson
- Posted On
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Due to a weather system later this week that’s anticipated to bring winds similar to those during the North Bay fires two years ago, Pacific Gas and Electric has increased the likelihood that Lake and many other counties across Northern California could be subject to a public safety power shutoff.
The situation prompted Lake County Sheriff Brian Martin on Sunday evening to issue a social media message warning county residents that the power could be cut for several days.
The National Weather Service has issued a fire weather watch for parts of Northern California including Lake County that will begin at 5 a.m. Wednesday and continue through 5 p.m. Thursday.
A fire weather watch means that critical fire weather conditions are forecast to occur, the agency said.
The forecast says a low pressure system will create gusty north to east winds over portions of interior Northern California Wednesday and Thursday, with winds of between 10 to 20 miles per hour, and gusts ranging up to 45 miles per hour, coupled with low relative humidities.
Those conditions will lead to critical fire weather conditions for the northern Coastal Range and foothills, the Sacramento Valley, and the Northern Sierra Nevada and foothills below 6,000 feet, the National Weather Service said.
In response, PG&E has placed Lake County under a public safety power shutoff “watch” for Wednesday and Thursday, which means that the company’s emergency operations center “is activated for a reasonable chance” of executing a power shutoff due to a combination of adverse weather and dry fuel conditions.
A PSPS watch, the company said, is typically only issued within 72 hours before the anticipated start of an event.
Lake County also is listed by PG&E as being under an “elevated” risk of a power shutoff on Friday, due to conditions.
The company said weather models are continuing to indicate the potential for a widespread and strong offshore wind event Wednesday through Friday. “Based on forecasted wind speeds and pressure gradients from high resolution and global forecast models, this is expected to be the strongest event of the season and is of significant concern.”
PG&E said the north and northeast pressure gradients – which relate to atmospheric pressure – that are forecast to develop over Northern California this week have not been as strong since the North Bay firestorm event of Oct. 8 and 9, 2017. The Sulphur Fire in Lake County was one of the fires that occurred at that time.
On Sunday evening, Lake County Sheriff Brian Martin posted a Facebook video in which he said that he had been on a conference call with PG&E and the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services about the situation.
He said they discussed the likelihood of 39 counties experiencing some level of public safety power shutoff as early as 6 a.m. on Wednesday.
The good news is, the county has a few days to prepare. “The bad news is, this is going to be pretty likely to occur,” Martin said.
Martin said there are 21 counties, including Lake, that have a high probability – meaning, 75 percent chance or greater – of experiencing a power shutoff.
The power shutoff is anticipated to hit Lake County at around 6 a.m. Wednesday, Martin said.
He said it’s a very large event, and so it may be an extended outage due to the number of customers.
That could mean that power is out for as long as five days from the “all clear” which would be expected to occur on Thursday, he said.
“This is going to have some significant impacts here in Lake County,” Martin said.
As of Sunday night, no maps of the proposed outage area were available, although Martin said it’s expected PG&E will provide them on Monday. He and his agency also are to be on a rotating cycle of phone calls with the utility.
Martin said the predictions are for winds of up to 60 to 70 miles per hour on the high elevations, such as Mount St. Helena.
Martin said there were no numbers available Sunday night as to how many customers in Lake or neighboring counties could be impacted by the shutoff.
In recent weeks there had been concerns of power shutoffs to Lake County that didn’t occur, but Martin said Sunday that, it “sounds like it’s going to be the real deal this time.”
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