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up front Wednesday 23 OctOber 2019

Blackout Round 2? Californians brace for possible outage

lic safety," Newsom wrote, a catastrophic wildfire," son, which had warned of
referring to the number of Johnson said in a Monday possible outages at any
businesses and households briefing. time, announced Mon-
affected, not the total A huge portion of Califor- day evening that none
number of people. nia is under high fire risk would take place in the
PG&E says the shutdowns amid unpredictable gusts next 48 hours but warned
are not about money. and soaring temperatures. that it was monitoring the
"The sole intent is to prevent Southern California Edi- weather.q

Firefighters watch as a helicopter drops water in a wildfire in the
Pacific Palisades area of Los Angeles, Monday, Oct. 21, 2019.
Associated Press
Continued from Front become a regular occur-
rence now that fire season
Earlier this week, PG&E no- in California is a year-round
tified 200,000 customers, or phenomenon.
roughly a half-million peo- "It's going to be an annual
ple, that it could begin a event, I'm afraid. I hate to
new round of precaution- say it, but I believe it's prob-
ary shut-offs mostly in the ably true," he said.
Sierra foothills and north PG&E has cast the black-
of the San Francisco Bay outs as a matter of public
Area. Blackouts would last safety to prevent the kind
at least 48 hours, the utility of blazes that have killed
said. scores of people in Califor-
PG&E says it's concerned nia over the past several
that winds forecast to hit 60 years, destroyed thousands
mph (97 kph) could throw of homes, and ran up tens
branches and debris into of billions of dollars in claims
power lines or topple them, that drove the company
sparking wildfires. into bankruptcy.
At Murphy's Irish Pub in California Gov. Gavin sent
Sonoma, co-owner Der- a sharply worded letter
mot Coll groaned at the Tuesday to Bill Johnson,
thought of another power CEO of the utility, blaming
outage. the unprecedented mass
The watering hole kept outage earlier this month
its doors open during the on the company's failure to
last 48-hour shut-off, but it maintain and upgrade its
wasn't easy because gen- equipment.
erator power to the walk-in "I believe the unaccepta-
coolers kept failing. ble scope and duration of
"We made it work, but it the previous outage — de-
was a headache," Coll liberately forcing 735,000
said. "We kept saying, 'Is customers to endure power
this even worth it?'" outages — was the direct
Coll said he fears that pre- result of decades of PG&E
cautionary blackouts will prioritizing profit over pub-