Critics say PG&E ignored red flags ahead of Dixie Fire – NBC Bay Area

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Experts say PG&E ignored the apparent danger signs leading to the Dixie blaze and kept the current going hours after a tree fell on the line, where it finally started the blaze which has now reached a peak. quarter of a million acres.

The July 13 fire started in the afternoon along the PG & Es Bucks Creek 1101 circuit, which runs along the rugged Feather River Canyon in Plumas County.

PG&E’s account of the events leading up to the fire, submitted to a federal judge overseeing its testing in the San Bruno gas explosion, notes that just before 7 a.m. on the day of the fire, there was a short on the Bucks Creek line.

It was at this point, according to the utility, that a 70-foot-tall Douglas fir fell on the line near the Cresta Dam.

The power fluctuated for a fraction of a second. He blew two fuses, cutting off power to the nearby dam. But it was too short to trigger automated equipment that could completely shut down the line. The company did not specify in its file why it had not remotely shut down the entire system.

PG&E had enough information they should have gathered it to know they should have cut power to their line, said Ken Buske, an electrical engineer who has been investigating the cause of the fires for 40 years. They should have assumed that a fire had broken out by then, or at least that they needed to cut the power to the line.

It took the lineman several hours to get to where those fuses failed. By this time it was late afternoon and the fire was already on.

What probably happened is that all day long this tree branch has been rubbing on the line – on an uninsulated power line – like a bow against a violin, former CPUC commissioner Catherine said. Sandoval, who advises Judge William Alsup as he oversees the company’s criminal probation.

This devastating fire could have been avoided by recognizing the danger of these voltage fluctuations, especially in these rural areas with high fire threat, she said.

The NBC Bay Areas investigative unit has learned that PG&E recently ranked the Bucks Creek line 11th on its list of highest risk circuits for equipment-triggered wildfires, and it Classified as moderately high risk for fires started by tree contact with lines.

PG&E hoped to bury that part of the line where the line started. In April, he summoned officials from Cal Fire, the State Utilities Commission and an energy consulting firm advising Gov. Gavin Newsom on the line, hoping to accelerate a plan to put it underground.

In a statement, the utility said it was seeking to make it known that it believed the Bucks Creek underground project was at high risk of delaying its completion due to several government permit requirements.

At the time of the fire, however, PG&E had not yet applied for a permit and the project was in the engineering and appraisal phase, the company said.

Buske said the lax response to the incident belies concerns expressed by the company about the fire danger.

It’s kind of like the guy who says this line is high risk is in one room, he said, and there’s another room where the guy who’s answering is seated. And he never knows about the guy in the room next to him. It’s like they don’t communicate and they don’t think there has to be a response when there is high risk.

PG&E made no further comment on Friday beyond what was contained in its reports to regulators and the judge about the fire.

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