With much of the East Bay and North Bay under a Red Flag Warning Sunday through Tuesday, PG&E has warned that as many as 25,000 customer accounts across the state could lose power Monday.

The potential planned Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) event was initially expected to impact some 44,000 PG&E account holders, though it's been reduced by 19,000 accounts as of Sunday afternoon. Though the possible PSPS event could affect 22 CA counties, most of those accounts being temporarily powered off will be those within the Northern Sierra Foothills, North Bay, and North Coast regions; a small number of account holders in the Bay Area and Central Valley customers will also be affected.

In a report by ABC7, the most affected counties from this PSPS event would be those in or near Wine Country. Solano County might see 4,561 customers lose power, while 2,207 Napa residents could lose power sometime Monday; other NorCal areas like Lake and Shasta counties could also see thousands without power.

The National Weather Service upgraded yesterday’s Fire Weather Watch to a Red Flag Warning on Sunday when offshore winds were projected to be stronger than previously thought. These high winds, combined with bone-dry vegetation caused by the drought, could increase the risk of trees falling on power lines and sparking wildfires, per PG&E.

As with all PSPS events, power is turned off for certain customer accounts to help prevent wildfires in at-risk areas, which are those usually under some kind of fire watch, i.e. a Red Flag Warning. During these events, PG&E should notify affected customers by phone, text, and email. The next step above a PSPS Outage Watch would be an Outage Warning, which necessitates the need to shut off power; those whose accounts would be affected by the power outage are notified within a few hours prior to this PSPS event.

For more information on PSPS events, as well as how to prepare for them, visit this URL; updates on current PSPS warnings and outages can be found here.

Related: [Update] Red Flag Warning Issued for North Bay Mountains, Parts of East Bay

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