More than 360,000 PG
&
amp;E customers lost power in the Bay Area, 81 customers
affected in Morgan Hill, 9 in Gilroy
Morgan Hill – High winds gusting between 55-75 miles per hour swept through the Bay Area on Wednesday, knocking down trees and blowing branches and debris into power lines.
Utility crews scrambled to fix the damage, which left more than 360,000 Pacific Gas & Electric Company customers in the Bay Area without service – including at least 30,000 in Santa Clara County and 81 customers in Morgan Hill.
Gilroy escaped the brunt of the damage, with only nine outages reported.
PG&E spokesman Paul Moreno on Wednesday said widespread blackouts had been reported in Campbell, Saratoga and San Jose. All of Morgan Hill’s power, he added, which went out late Tuesday evening had been restored by 12:30am Wednesday.
The post-Christmas storm brought three inches of rain to some parts of the Bay Area, but South County received less rainfall than expected.
Gilroy Fire Chief Dale Foster said the storm caused no significant damage to the region, but the weather caused difficulties in the Bay Area and beyond.
As of 3pm Thursday, utility crews had restored power to 355,978 Bay Area customers, leaving 4,261 without power.
Remote parts of the Santa Cruz mountains may not regain electricity until sometime today.
As a result of this winter’s first major storm, more than 2,000 separate locations have been impacted to date, with damage to 88 poles, 115 transformers and roughly 117 miles of power lines.
To respond to the damage caused by the storm, PG&E moved crews into the most heavily impacted areas.
Nearly 1,100 assigned PG&E crews have been joined by an additional 15 contract crews brought in for restoration efforts.
Tony Burchyns covers Morgan Hill for The Times. Reach him at
(408) 779-4106 ext. 201 or tburchyns@morganhilltimes.
