PG&E Cuts Power to 15,000 Customers as Dry Winds Whip Across California

Updated 12:10 p.m. Friday

PG&E has cut electricity to thousands of Bay Area customers because of significant winds that are expected to run through Saturday.

The utility is worried that strong gusts will cause trees or limbs to fall on power lines and ignite a wildfire, which could spread rapidly in the dry wind.

As of 11:30 a.m. on Friday, PG&E said 8,184 customers were without power across the Bay Area, with the North Bay hit hardest. Napa County had 3,126 customers without power, Sonoma had 1,001, and Solano had 2,001.

Hundreds of customers are also without power in Alameda, Contra Costa and Santa Clara counties.

JD Guidi, a PG&E representative, told KQED that the utility has shut down electricity for 15,000 customers throughout its entire California service area.

It’s possible the utility could still turn the power off for an additional 5,000 customers, although some who had their power cut could get it restored later Friday. Find details about the location of these outages on KQED’s map.

The utility said it is standing up dozens of community centers to provide support for customers, including “ADA-accessible restrooms, device charging, Wi-Fi, blankets, air conditioning, bottled water and snacks, and more.”

You can find a list of locations organized by county on PG&E’s website.

“The duration and extent of power outages will depend on the weather in each area, and not all customers will be affected for the entire period,” the company said in a statement.

The preventive power shutoffs come as the National Weather Service has issued a red flag warning for nearly the entire Bay Area through Saturday afternoon.

The agency said relative humidity dropped overnight in the North Bay and East Bay.

Several weather stations reported winds as high as 50 mph, meteorologists said. The strongest gust was detected at Mount St. Helena at 75 mph.

The agency’s Bay Area office noted in its latest forecast discussion that fire weather concerns will “only increase throughout this event due to the compounding effects of the antecedent conditions and a backdoor cold front ushering in much drier air through the day today.”

Fire departments are preparing for the potential of a fast-moving wildfire during the course of the weekend. Karen Hancock, a spokesperson for the Sonoma County Fire District, said firefighters, fire equipment and a helicopter are standing by.

“We are putting those resources out in the field throughout our fire district so that if an emergency does occur during this event, we are already out in the field in our more susceptible areas,” she said.

This is a developing story; it will be updated.