Nearly 60,000 without electricity in Northern California as PG&E cuts power due to fire risk

Pacific Gas and Electric’s power shutoff remained in effect Monday morning, affecting nearly 42,000 people in the Sierra foothills east of Sacramento, and nearly 60,000 people across Northern California.

Due to red flag weather warnings and high fire risk, the utility giant began de-energizing power lines Sunday at 8:48 p.m. in El Dorado, Amador and Calaveras counties.

Communities affected include:

• El Dorado County: Aukum, Camino, Coloma, Cool, Diamond Springs, El Dorado, Fair Play, Garden Valley, Georgetown, Greenwood, Grizzly Flats, Kelsey, Kyburz, Mount Aukum, Omo Ranch, Pacific House, Placerville, Pollock Pines, Shingle Springs, Silver Fork, Somerset, Strawberry, Twin Bridges

• Amador County: Fiddletown, Jackson, Pine Grove, Pioneer, Plymouth, Sutter Creek, Volcano

• Calaveras County: Glencoe, Mokelumne Hill, Mountain Ranch, Rail Road Flat, West Point, Wilseyville

Shutoffs were also in effect in Lake, Napa and Sonoma counties, areas that were plagued by destructive wildfires last October.

The disruption shut schools in several areas: Late Sunday, the El Dorado Union High School District said it canceled Monday’s classes because of the controlled outage, affecting more than 6,600 students and 500 teachers and classified staff. Other schools that will be closed include Placerville Union, Mother Lode Union and Gold Trail Union school districts.

The power shutoff will continue throughout Monday and possibly through Tuesday depending on weather conditions and the state of power lines, said Melissa Subbotin, PG&E spokeswoman.

“We have crews en route now to conduct visual inspection of the lines to determine whether repairs need to be made and if it’s safe to restore power,” she said.

The shutoff is intended to limit the danger posed by strong winds whipping electrical lines into trees or snapping them to the ground to ignite brush. That happened in at least 12 wildfires last October, according to Cal Fire. Officials in June blamed PG&E’s power and distribution lines, and the failure of its power poles, for fires in Mendocino, Humboldt, Butte, Sonoma, Lake and Napa counties.

Cal Fire has also blamed “sagging power lines” for causing the Cascade Fire that killed four in Yuba County in October.

This story was originally published October 15, 2018 at 9:02 AM with the headline "Nearly 60,000 without electricity in Northern California as PG&E cuts power due to fire risk."