Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) is preparing for two strong winter storms forecasted to hit Northern and Central California during the holiday week. The company has mobilized crews and resources in anticipation of heavy rain, strong winds, and mountain snow that could lead to widespread power outages.
According to PG&E’s meteorologist, some areas along the North Coast may receive between four and ten inches of rain, with snow levels expected above 6,000 feet. The first storm system is predicted to arrive on Tuesday, followed by a second system later on Wednesday.
PG&E has activated its Emergency Operations Center as well as regional and local storm rooms. The utility is pre-positioning additional crews in areas where the impact is expected to be most severe. More than 5,500 front-line workers and contractors are on duty for the storm response, including over 1,500 gas and electric crew members and nearly 3,000 tree workers.
“Just as PG&E prepares for natural disasters and emergencies, we encourage our customers to prepare as well,” said Peter Kenny, PG&E’s Senior Vice President of Electric Operations. “These storms have the potential to disrupt holiday plans; therefore, we have prepositioned resources and will be an all-hands-on-deck response from PG&E to safely restore power as quickly as possible.”
The company has also been coordinating with local governments to share preparation efforts.
PG&E advises customers to take safety precautions ahead of the storms. Customers can access updated outage information through PG&E’s online outage center, which now provides details such as outage causes, crew status updates, estimated restoration times, and confirmation when power is restored. Those receiving outage texts can reply “status” for updates without visiting the website.
Further safety tips are available at Safety and Preparedness, Storm Safety, and Safety Action Center on PG&E’s website.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company serves more than 16 million people across a 70,000-square-mile area in Northern and Central California. More information about the company can be found at pge.com or pge.com/news.
The original press release can be viewed at https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/pge-mobilizes-for-potent-holiday-week-storm-system-302648136.html
