There was a problem at a Pacific Gas and Electric Co. transmission tower near where a wildfire started Wednesday night in Sonoma County around the same time the blaze sparked, a report says.
PG&E said it became aware around 9:20 p.m. of a transmission level outage in the Geysers area, according to a report the utility filed Thursday morning with the California Public Utilities Commission in response to the Kincade Fire.
“This tower is 43 years old, which is pretty common in the industry — that’s not an old tower,” said PG&E CEO Bill Johnson at a news conference. “It has been inspected four times in the last two years.”
Around 7:30 a.m. Thursday, a PG&E worker noticed that Cal Fire had taped off the area around the base of a transmission tower. Cal Fire also pointed out a broken jumper on the same tower, the report says.
Cal Fire has not determined the cause of the Kincade Fire, which has forced hundreds of people to evacuate and had charred an estimated 10,000 acres as of mid-morning Thursday.
The fire started around 9:30 p.m. near John Kincade Road.
The fire sparked in an area affected by Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s Public Safety Power Shutoffs, which the utility is doing to reduce risk of its equipment sparking a fire.
PG&E said power was shut off around 3 p.m. Wednesday for about 27,800 customers in portions of Sonoma County.
Transmission lines, however, were operating in the area at the time the fire broke out.
“As part of the PSPS, PG&E distribution lines in these areas were deenergized. Following PG&E’s established PSPS protocols and procedures, transmission lines in these areas remained energized,” a PG&E statement says.
“Those transmission lines were not deenergized because forecast weather conditions, particularly wind speeds, did not trigger the PSPS protocol. The wind speeds of concern for transmission lines are higher than those for distribution,” the statement goes on to say.
The fire jumped Highway 128 and headed west, and the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office urged all residents of Geyserville to evacuate. AlertWildfire cameras captured the flames around 9:30 p.m.
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