A full schedule of public safety power shutoff (PSPS) duration estimates is now available for October 14 to 16, and PG&E says around 54,000 customers in 24 counties are likely to be affected.
We learned on Monday that a PSPS event was likely this week, with hot and dry conditions persisting and gusty Diablo winds set to arrive Wednesday night. And while parts of San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties, particularly around the Santa Cruz Mountains, are expected to be impacted, the latest wind forecast from the National Weather Service suggests the highest gusts will be felt in the East Bay hills, and in the North Bay Hills in northern and eastern Sonoma County and northern Napa County.
Wind forecast for tonight shows the strongest winds will be in the North and East Bay Hills above 1000 feet where maximum gusts of 40-50 mph are possible. #cawx pic.twitter.com/iDiT8CQMr0
— NWS Bay Area (@NWSBayArea) October 14, 2020
On Tuesday, the Fire Weather Watch was upgraded to a Red Flag Warning, and unlike in previous warnings this one includes valley areas in the North and East Bay.
For Alameda and Contra Costa counties, the PSPS is expected to begin between 8 p.m. Wednesday and 1 a.m. Thursday, with Walnut Creek and unincorporated Contra Costa County likely to lose power on the earlier side. Around 5,100 customers in the Oakland hills are expected to lose power after 10 p.m. tonight, along with around 780 households and businesses in unincorporated Contra Costa County.
Estimated power restoration for these areas is 10 p.m. on Thursday.
Another 2,200 PG&E customers are also likely to lose power in Milpitas and unincorporated Santa Clara County between 8 and 10 p.m. Wednesday.
Longer outages of around 50-52 hours are expected for Sonoma and Napa counties, with the power cutting off for around 2,500 households and businesses between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. Wednesday in St. Helena and Calistoga, and estimated restoration of power being 10 p.m. on Friday. In Sonoma, the majority of the 1,684 customers impacted are in unincorporated parts of the county, with 97 in the town of Sonoma. Those shutoffs also begin between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. Wednesday, and may last until 10 p.m. Friday.
In total, upwards of 160,000 people are likely to lose to power tonight — a significant number but a smaller swath than in PSPS events last fall. (PG&E had pledged to make these shutoffs more targeted and shorter in duration this year.) The 24 counties with impacted customers are Alameda, Amador, Butte, Calaveras, Contra Costa, El Dorado, Humboldt, Lake, Monterey, Napa, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Shasta, Sierra, Solano, Sonoma, Tehama, Trinity, Yolo, and Yuba.
