Thousands in Sierra foothills going days without power as snow pounds Northern California
Thousands of households and businesses remained without power Wednesday afternoon in the Sierra Nevada foothills as a strong winter storm passing through California has pounded the region with snow at low elevations since the weekend, downing Pacific Gas and Electric Co. equipment.
Brandi Merlo, a PG&E spokeswoman representing the utility’s Sacramento, Stockton and Sierra foothills service areas, Tweeted about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday that about 16,200 customers remained without power across several counties, including nearly 7,800 in El Dorado, more than 2,100 in Calaveras, over 1,600 in Amado, more than 1,800 in Nevada, and about 1,400 in Placer.
She said Wednesday evening that crews were still finding damage and down trees. Merlo also said that more than 150 crews were out in the field working to restore as many customers as possible, and additional were on the way for Thursday.
Amador County couple trying to avoid coronavirus
Donna Nobriga, an Amador County resident, told The Sacramento Bee that it’s hard staying healthy without heat with only cold water. She lives in the small town of Pioneer, which mostly has retired residents who are trying to do the right thing by staying home to help slow the coronavirus spread.
“I know there are people in worse shape but we aren’t going to be able to stay isolated without power,” Nobriga said.
She said her home and the surrounding area were been blanketed with snow. They have neighbors who shared some of their wood Wednesday. They also have a working a refrigerator, a couple lights and, most importantly, a cell phone they can charge.
“My husband and I are one of the lucky ones,” Nobriga said. “We were able to buy a generator.”
But that means they have to find, buy and carry gasoline home to fuel the generator. Nobriga said her husband is an elderly man with diabetes and heart disease, and she has severe arthritis. So, lifting a gasoline tank and pouring gas into a generator isn’t easy for them.
Power to her home was restored about 8:45 p.m. Wednesday after three days without electricity.
Placer County 911
The Placer County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday afternoon received information from AT&T that some residents in the Brockway area were unable to call 911. But sheriff’s officials warned residents to not test the system by calling 911. Instead, they asked residents to call 530-823-4411 if they need 911 emergency help. Sheriff’s officials said it was unknown exactly which area was affected.
Since Monday, Merlo has documented on Twitter a consistent series of outages, including a Monday evening video showing crews working to fix power lines that fell across Highway 50 in Pollock Pines, with workers on the ground standing in thick powder as snow continued to fall.
She tweeted Tuesday morning that 90 crews were working throughout Nevada, Placer, El Dorado and Sierra counties to restore the outages. A day later on Wednesday morning, 101 crews remained at work trying to restore power to 13,000 customers in those four counties, plus 47 additional crews addressing outages affecting about 2,700 customers in each of Amador and Calaveras counties. No estimated times for restoration have been given by the utility.
The National Weather Service’s Reno office reports that the winter storm dropped about 2 feet of snow in the 24 hours between Saturday and Sunday mornings, and by Tuesday morning, some high peaks had recorded more than 6 feet. Snow also fell at a strong rate in the foothills, with inches falling at elevations down to about 3,500 feet on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.
Snowfall is continuing in the Sierra on Wednesday morning, with the NWS and Caltrans advising chain controls are in place throughout mountain highways.
This story was originally published March 18, 2020 at 10:41 AM.
