How PG&E missed its chance to prevent the Camp Fire: Damning report on utility’s negligence

Prosecutors in tiny Butte County, wrapping up their investigation into the deadliest wildfire in California history, painted PG&E Corp. on Tuesday as inept, incompetent and callously indifferent to the fire dangers in their rural community, far removed from the utility’s San Francisco headquarters.

A damning 92-page investigative report issued by District Attorney Mike Ramsey said PG&E skimped on maintenance and inspections of its transmission equipment out of ignorance and a desire to save money. In rural communities like Butte County, the company dispatched less-qualified inspectors and maintenance workers who missed warning signs on PG&E’s century-old infrastructure.

Ramsey’s report called PG&E’s maintenance of the transmission lines and towers in Butte County a “run to failure” that led directly, perhaps inevitably, to the Camp Fire — the Nov. 8, 2018, catastrophe that left 85 people dead and destroyed thousands of buildings in Paradise and nearby communities.

“The evidence developed during this investigation clearly established that the reckless actions of PG&E created the risk of a catastrophic fire in the Feather River Canyon, that PG&E knew of that risk and PG&E ignored the risk by not taking any action to mitigate the risk,” the report said.

The DA’s report was consistent with other investigators’ conclusions about the Camp Fire, including a 2019 probe by the Public Utilities Commission that determined that PG&E had failed to thoroughly inspect the transmission tower that caused the fire.

Butte County’s report was the result of a year-long investigation by a special grand jury that began its work about four months after the fire. The panel concluded that PG&E made only minimal effort to maintain a high-voltage transmission line known as the Caribou-Palermo line, where the fire started.

“PG&E was employing a run to failure strategy on the entirety of the Caribou-Big Bend section of the Caribou-Palermo line,” the report said. “Pursuant to the run to failure strategy, PG&E only applied a low degree or patrol with minimal frequency to continuously assess risk, and only performed corrective maintenance.”

CEO pleads guilty to criminal charges against PG&E

The report was released hours after PG&E, represented in court by Chief Executive Bill Johnson, pleaded guilty to 84 counts of felony manslaughter in Butte County Superior Court in connection with the Camp Fire. The utility, under a plea agreement announced in March, also admitted to a single count of unlawfully starting a fire.

The company admitted to only 84 manslaughter counts because one of the fire victims was found to have taken his own life, and Ramsey said investigators couldn’t validate their initial suspicions that he had killed himself to avoid being burned.

“We’re doing everything we can to make this right,” PG&E Chief Executive Bill Johnson said in court Tuesday. He stood for a half hour as each charge — and the name of each victim — was read aloud, answering each with, “Guilty, your honor.”

Johnson said PG&E has overhauled its inspection program and taken other steps to make sure “the tragedy that occurred here never happens again.”

Ramsey praised Johnson’s willingness to stand up in court but was unsparing in his criticism of PG&E during a press conference afterward: “Those 84 people did not need to die if PG&E had done its job in a reasonable way,” the district attorney said.

Driven into bankruptcy by the damages caused during the Camp Fire and other major wildfires, PG&E has vowed to essentially reinvent itself, promising to put greater emphasis on safety. It has permanently mothballed the transmission line where the fire occurred.

The utility expects to receive final approval for its bankruptcy reorganization plan, which is built around a $13.5 billion payout to survivors of that series of wildfires, within days.

According to the Butte DA’s report, the Camp Fire was nearly a century in the making.

The fire was lit when a worn-out clamp, called a C-hook, failed on a high-voltage transmission line northeast of Paradise. The failure allowed a live wire to brush against the transmission tower, sending molten steel and aluminum to the dry ground below. Within minutes, howling winds were blowing the flames toward Paradise.

The DA’s investigators, aided by an FBI crime lab and state investigators, determined that the C-hook had been wearing down for at least 97 years. Inspection crews knew the part was being worn but failed to detect the extent of the deterioration.

“The fact the C hook was constantly rubbing back forth against the hanger hole was known,” the report said. “The fact that PG&E relied on a 97 (to) 100 year old C hook it knew nothing about to hold an energized 115 (kilovolt) conductor is, by itself, negligent and reckless.”

‘Inexperienced, untrained and unqualified’

In the past 30 years or so, PG&E has reduced the frequency of inspections on the transmission line around Paradise, the report said.

The company created a job category in the 1980s called “Troubleman.” Those employees were supposed to be skilled specialists, experts in snooping out dangerous problems on PG&E’s lines.

But in reality, the workers assigned to the equipment around Paradise were “inexperienced, untrained and unqualified,” the report said.

PG&E also pressured inspectors to reduce the time and money spent on their work.

“When asked, a former Transmission Line supervisor asserted that because of the artificially constrained budget, his district was constantly under pressure to limit the hours necessary to complete thorough inspections and patrols of transmission lines,” the report said.

In addition, the DA’s report said there was evidence that PG&E pays a lot less attention to maintenance and inspection in lightly populated areas like Butte County.

“The towers that served the hinterlands, the Feather River Canyon ... got short shrift,” Ramsey said at his press conference. “The rural folks were certainly sacrificed ... for the reliability of power in the Bay Area.”

While maintenance problems in the Bay Area get a quick response, “we’re kind of out-of-sight, out of mind” in rural areas, a former transmission line supervisor told investigators.

“In large population areas PG&E was staffed by experts, trained and qualified engineers and specialists having decades of experience,” the report said. “In less populated areas, Transmission Line Management was almost completely dependent upon less qualified Troublemen, Linemen and Towermen and other personnel.”

As part of its bankruptcy plan, PG&E has promised California regulators it will reorganize itself into regional operating units, with a chief safety officer assigned to each region as part of its pledge to reduce fire risks.

This story was originally published June 16, 2020 at 2:00 PM.