Strong winds headed for Southern California; many supports for power disconnections

SAN BERNARDINO, California (KABC) – The dangerous winds from Santa Ana are moving to Southland, increasing the danger of fire as thousands are under threat of being shut down.

Southern California will be hit on Tuesday with rising winds, low relative humidity and low humidity, making firefighters on the alert.

A huge area is affected – from Santa Clarita to the highlands, from the Los Angeles basin to the Santa Monica Mountains and all the way to the coast. At higher altitudes, gusts can reach up to 145 km / h.

“We are currently under pressure,” said Roland Sprewell of the Los Angeles Fire Department. “We have a relentless season of forest fires that just don’t seem to want to go.”

In response, local firefighters are increasing their staff. They are sending attack teams to higher risk locations. They are also restricting parking in areas of high fire severity to ensure that fire trucks have a place to park if a fire starts.

Anticipating extreme winds, Southern California Edison is already turning off the power to some of its customers.

The wind was already strong in San Bernardino’s North Park neighborhood on Monday afternoon, where residents are preparing for yet another public safety blackout.

“Everyone is buying generators now, it is quite normal,” said James Garcia.

“It is not a good normal. Nothing else is a good normal,” said Joe Lunt.

Many of the neighbors have invested in power generators due to the frequency with which electricity comes out during wind events.

“Today, we guarantee that we have enough oil and gas to guarantee that the generator will run for 25 to 30 hours. The maximum we hung up was 28 hours, ”said Mary Beth Norris.

Norris says that his major concern is elderly neighbors.

“What frankly scares me are the people who are on oxygen machines, they have no way of keeping them running after the battery is plugged into their oxygen machines.”

Potentially, more than 32,000 Southern California Edison customers in San Bernardino County could experience disruptions in the coming days.

In Ventura County, more than 113,000 customers were preparing for a possible outage.

“Very strong and damaging winds are expected from Monday morning to Wednesday morning, and with no rain for the past four weeks, the predicted strong winds and high temperatures are bringing a high risk of forest fires,” said Ron Wales of Southern California Edison.

In Anaheim, strong winds prompted authorities to close the COVID-19 mass vaccination site at Disneyland on Tuesday. Appointments for Tuesday will be rescheduled for another day, according to city officials in Anaheim.

The power cut is designed to reduce the risk of fire caused by electrical equipment when strong winds are forecast. Several major fires in California were related to electrical equipment.

SCE customers can subscribe to receive alerts to let them know if the power will be turned off.

Some of the largest and most devastating forest fires in California history have been associated with electrical equipment.