8,770 customers remain without power in Mendocino Co. — PG&E says some may not get power till Friday

WILLITS, 1/28/21 — At least 8,770 PG&E customers remain without power in Mendocino County, among 78,000 across NorCal. The power utility counts these outage in terms of customers, essentially power connections, which means that the number of people affected by this is likely far higher.

In parts of Brooktrails people have been without power since the beginning of the storm, and heavy snow, downed trees, and generally difficult conditions have kept linemen from reaching the affected areas. Indeed, in the first day of the storm there were moments when U.S. Route 101 was closed at several points, effectively isolating towns from each other, and keeping power-line repair people from evening being able to reach affected locations.

Though PG&E is promising to restore power to some areas by tonight, many areas, including parts of Brooktrails, Willits, may not be re-energized until late tomorrow, Friday. In Laytonville the PG&E outage website gives an expected restoration date of Saturday, and in Covelo not estimate is even offered.

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Here is the latest press release from PG&E:

This intense series of winter storms started on Tuesday, Jan. 26, and continues into today and tomorrow.  The impacts are being felt in different parts of PG&E’s service area at different times.  At present, we have about 78,000 customers out on storm-caused outages. Of those, about 68,000 were impacted by the storm that hit Tuesday through Wednesday evening and the remaining are without power due to storm impacts from Wednesday evening through today.  Approximately 8,770 of those customer accounts that are currently impacted are in Mendocino County. We were able to restore some customers in Hopland, Ukiah and Redwood Valley last night.  We do expect to restore power to additional customers in Ukiah and Redwood Valley today.

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We know the importance of restoring power safely and as quickly as possible and know that hundreds of PG&E, contractor and mutual-aid electric and vegetation management crews are working around-the-clock to restore service to customers. 

Damage from wind, heavy rains and snow, and access issues due to roads blocked by trees, debris and snow, is most severe in a few locations. Yolo, San Joaquin, Mendocino, Humboldt and Calaveras are the counties with the most customer outages as of this morning.

PG&E has been and will continue to move crews from less-impacted areas into these locations.  PG&E has asked for mutual-aid support from other Western utilities and has started to on-board some of those crews. As of this morning, 25 crews are on-site with another 8 crews expected. (33 total). 

PG&E has been working closely with county offices of emergency services to support the storm response.  PG&E is aware the hardship that extended outages represent and appreciates the patience of our customers.  PG&E will be reaching out to every customer today who is still without power due to storm-related outages. This includes automated phone calls with updated information as well as through other channels.

In areas with damaged infrastructure and access issues, restoration will extend into Friday or longer. PG&E will share an estimated time of restoration (ETOR) for all customers in areas where damage assessment has been completed. The remaining customers will be contacted to let them know when we expect to have a troubleman or inspector in their area to assess the damage.

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Customers can call PG&E at (800) 743-5002 for additional information.

Here’s a look at where all the outages are in Mendo County, according to customer account addresses, as of noon:

Branscomb – 143
Covelo – 1,256
Cummings – 37
Dos Rios – 65
Hopland – 1
Laytonville – 1321
Leggett – 369
Philo – 22
Piercy – 136
Potter Valley – 6
Redwood Valley – 1728
Ukiah – 249
Willits – 3,434
Yorkville – 3

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