PG&E Warns 1,100 Santa Barbara County Customers of Possible Safety Shutoffs as Fire Weather and Heat Arrive Together
The utility sent day-ahead notices Tuesday for a possible shutoff starting Wednesday evening. A fire weather watch covers the county's interior mountains Friday, and a heat advisory runs Thursday morning through Saturday evening.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company has warned about 1,100 of its Santa Barbara County customers that their power may be turned off for safety starting Wednesday evening, as dry offshore winds raise wildfire risk across California. The county figure includes 26 customers in the utility's Medical Baseline program, according to the customer table PG&E published Tuesday.
The possible Public Safety Power Shutoff could affect approximately 70,000 customers across 29 counties, including 3,920 Medical Baseline customers statewide, PG&E said. The utility sent one-day advance notifications on Tuesday afternoon to customers in the targeted areas, after an earlier round of notices began Monday. The event is forecast to start Wednesday evening, October 14, and last through Saturday afternoon.
PG&E said it is monitoring a dry offshore wind event in which the strongest winds are expected in the Sierra, the southern Central Coast and portions of the North and East Bay, with Santa Ana winds also expanding into the southern Los Padres on Friday. The utility said extremely dried vegetation and low humidity are driving the shutoff decision, which is meant to reduce the risk of wildfire from energized power lines.
The National Weather Service expects the fire danger to reach Santa Barbara County's backcountry late in the week. As the winds expand Thursday night into Friday, red flag conditions may form over the interior mountains of Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties on Friday, where a fire weather watch is now in effect, the Weather Service's Los Angeles and Oxnard office said in an updated warning issued Tuesday afternoon.
Heat arrives with the wind. A heat advisory from the Weather Service covers coastal and inland areas of Santa Barbara County from 10 a.m. Thursday to 8 p.m. Saturday, with temperatures up to 95 degrees expected in the advisory area. The Weather Service said the heat may cause heat illnesses and advised residents to drink plenty of fluids, stay in air-conditioned rooms, stay out of the sun and check on relatives and neighbors.
PG&E said customers can look up their address at pge.com/pspsupdates to find out whether their location is being monitored for the potential shutoff. The utility said it will conduct individual in-person visits, when possible, to Medical Baseline customers who do not confirm they received the safety notifications, and that it is arranging community resource centers in affected counties, with device charging, water, snacks and other supplies. Customers can also call 211 for help preparing for an outage.
The scope of the event may still change. PG&E said roughly 5,700 customers included in the original shutoff area have since been removed from it, while roughly 4,000 customers affected by shutoffs earlier in the week may be affected again by this event.
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