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As crews battle the growing Kincade Fire in Sonoma County and tamp down smaller blazes across Northern California, the region is bracing for its next challenge — a wave of preemptive power shutdowns that could impact as many 2.5 million customers, making it the biggest such shutdown yet.
The Kincade wildfire ignited late Wednesday near Geyserville and has since ripped through 23,700 acres of remote land, forcing 2,000 people out of their homes, damaging at least 49 structures, including 21 homes. Another 600 structures are threatened. As night fell Friday, containment stood at 5 percent and firefighters were racing to increase that percentage before the winds are forecast to pick up again Saturday evening..
And emergency officials in Sonoma County — along with their counterparts across much of the region — had another crisis on their hands after Pacific Gas & Electric confirmed that it would begin yet another “public safety power shutoff” Saturday, which could affect over 850,000 customers for at least 48 hours.
“We’re approaching this like a battle, and we have to really think about it as strategically as possible,” Mark Ghilarducci, director of the state Office of Emergency Services, said at a Friday press conference. “This is really sort of an unprecedented place we’re in as a state.”
Shutoffs could begin Saturday afternoon across portions of 36 counties in the North Bay, the Peninsula, East Bay, Central Coast and the Sierra foothills, constituting the largest preemptive blackout yet — just days after power was restored to 179,000 customers who lost electricity earlier this week.
The planned shutdowns were prompted by weather forecasts predicting that gusts up to 80 miles per hour could whip through the North Bay peaks this weekend, with valleys in the East and North Bay seeing winds of about 40 to 60 mph, according to Anna Schneider, meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
Together with low humidity and high heat, the roaring wind is expected to cast an unusually wide blanket of fire risk over much of the state.
“These could be the strongest winds that the region will have seen since the Wine Country fires in 2017,” Schneider said.
Word of the possible outages — which PG&E has said could last through Monday — trickled in to county agencies Friday. Approximately 57,630 customers in Alameda County, 48,824 in Contra Costa County and 27,093 in Santa Clara County will be affected. And another 92,877 customers in Sonoma County, 86,813 in Marin County, 64,932 in San Mateo County, 44,945 in Santa Cruz County, 10,232 in Solano County, and 993 in Monterey County will be without electricity.
PG&E officials said a decision about whether to initiate a public safety power shutoff will be made at 8 a.m. Saturday. If the utility moves forward with one, lines will be de-energized in the northern Sierra foothills at 3 p.m., in the North Bay at 5 p.m., in the Bay Area, Central Coast and southern Sierra foothills at 7 p.m., and in Kern County at 11 a.m. Sunday.
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Cal Fire Chief Thom Porter said that having the power shut off “doesn’t change a lot of the firefight itself” when it comes to battling the Kincade Fire — but presents challenges for communicating with the public about evacuations and updates.
“We have critical infrastructure for firefighting that when there’s no power makes it difficult to do,” Porter said, such as fire retardant plants at air bases that need power to pump retardant into airplanes.
Fire officials already had placed generators at airports in anticipation of shutoffs, Porter said. The Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office, meanwhile, has been preparing since early Friday morning with backup generators to keep emergency operations working when the power goes out.
Some residents have steeled themselves to evacuate in the dark. Karen McEwen, who lives in a high-fire danger area of Healdsburg and hasn’t had power since Wednesday, said, “It’s hard to get up-to-the-minute information about what’s going on” without access to the internet.
McEwen said she has been listening to the radio to find out where the Kincade Fire is moving. “The older things work better than the new things sometimes,” she said.
The cause of the Kincade Fire remains under investigation, though PG&E on Thursday disclosed that it had found broken equipment on one of its transmission towers near the fire’s point of origin. The tower in question was not turned off during the power outages in Sonoma County earlier this week.
PG&E CEO Bill Johnson said the company is “continuing to investigate” the cause of the fire. No additional information was available Friday.
But the utility’s explanations were insufficient for Governor Gavin Newsom, who said parts of Sonoma County looked like a “war zone” after touring the fire area Friday, and he again blasted the utility for failing to secure its power lines over the last decade.
“We should not have to be here,” Newsom said, attributing the rolling blackouts and wildfires to “years and years of greed, years and years of mismanagement” on the part of PG&E.
The state will issue grants to counties and cities to help them deal with the impact of blackouts, paid for from a $75 million fund that was passed in this year’s budget, Newsom said.
At least $150,000 will be awarded to all 58 of California’s counties, with more funding granted based on county size and experience with outages. The cities of Los Angeles, San Jose, San Diego and Oakland also will receive $500,000 each.
This weekend, the state plans to bring in a 747 jet to fight the Kincade Fire and other fires that may start around the state.
Already, hundreds of fire personnel fought to contain a handful of smaller fires. In San Mateo, the Cabrillo Fire scorched nearly 100 acres, while Marin County’s Muir Fire roared through 58 acres between Muir Beach and Stinson Beach. In the East Bay, the Mines Fire reached 50 acres.
Newsom said that Californians upset over having to live in fear of wildfires and power outages should direct their ire at PG&E above anything else.
“They simply did not do their job,” Newsom said. “It took us decades to get here, but we will get out of this mess.”
Back in Sonoma County, officials urged residents to keep the roadways clear for first responders as well as prepare for additional outages.
“Be safe,” said Sonoma County Supervisor David Rabbitt, “and we’ll get through the weekend together.”
Staff writers Jason Green and Thy Vo contributed to this report.
