Leroy N. Soetoro
2018-09-02 17:12:49 UTC
https://abc7news.com/cal-fire-releases-cause-of-12-north-bay-
wildfires/3579377/
MENDOCINO, Calif. (KGO) -- Cal Fire made an announcement Friday
determining the cause of nearly all of the North Bay Wildfires, which
broke out on October 8, 2017 and burned more than 200,000 acres and
claimed 44 lives.
On Friday, Cal Fire said 12 of the wildfires that broke out in Mendocino,
Humboldt, Butte, Sonoma, Lake, and Napa Counties were caused by "electric
power and distribution lines, conductors and the failure of power poles."
The October 2017 fire siege involved more than 170 fires and burned at
least 245,000 acres in Northern California. About 11,000 firefighters from
17 states and Australia helped battle the blazes.
CAL FIRE investigators were dispatched to the fires last year and
immediately began working to determine their origin and cause. Cal Fire
investigators continue to investigate the remaining 2017 fires, both in
October and December, and will release additional reports as they are
completed.
The only fire not included is the Tubbs Fire, because Cal Fire says that
report is not out yet. The Tubbs fire burned nearly 37,000 acres of Napa
and Sonoma County.
The Redwood Valley Fire in Mendocino County scorched more than 36,000
acres, destroyed more than 300 homes, and killed at least nine people.
They include the Shepherd family's two teenage children, burned while
trying to escape the flames. Cal Fire says trees fell onto PG&E power
lines, and sparked this fire.
Nearby, the Sulphur Fire in Lake County, was caused when PG&E power lines
hit the ground. It's the same finding that Cal Fire made last month with
regard to the October wildfires in Butte and Nevada Counties.
Cal Fire determined in three of those four fires, PG&E had failed to trim
back trees located near power lines, as mandated by state code.
PG&E already faces more than 100 lawsuits in these fires. If Cal Fire
holds the utility responsible in the Wine Country, where more than 8, 000
homes were destroyed, analysts say the 112-year old company may not
survive the financial hit.
State lawmaker Jerry Hill has already said if Cal Fire blames the North
Bay wildfires on PG&E negligence, he'll try to break up the utility.
Hill represents San Bruno, where an old PG&E gas pipeline exploded in
2010, killing eight people.
PG&E released a statement saying:
The safety of our customers, their families and the communities we serve
is our most important job. The loss of life, homes and businesses in these
extraordinary wildfires is simply heartbreaking, and we remain focused on
helping communities recover and rebuild.
Programs Overall Met State's High Standards
We look forward to the opportunity to carefully review the Cal Fire
reports to understand the agency's perspectives.
Based on the information we have so far, we continue to believe our
overall programs met our state's high standards.
For example, PG&E meets or exceeds regulatory requirements for pole
integrity management, using a comprehensive database to manage multiple
patrol and inspection schedules of our more than two million poles.
Similarly, under PG&E's industry-leading Vegetation Management Program, we
inspect and monitor every PG&E overhead electric transmission and
distribution line each year, with some locations patrolled multiple times.
We also prune or remove approximately 1.4 million trees annually.
Following Governor Brown's January 2014 Drought State of Emergency
Proclamation and the California Public Utilities Commission's Resolution
ESRB-4, PG&E added enhanced measures to address areas particularly
affected by drought and bark beetles including increased foot and aerial
patrols along power lines in high fire-risk areas, removal of hundreds of
thousands of dead or dying tree, and daily aerial fire detection patrols
during high fire season to improve fire spotting and speed of fire
response.
'New Normal' Requires New Solutions'
With that said, years of drought, extreme heat and 129 million dead trees
have created a "new normal" for our state that requires comprehensive new
solutions.
Extreme weather is increasing the number of large wildfires and the length
of the wildfire season in California. According to CAL FIRE, in 2017
alone, CAL FIRE confronted 7,117 wildfires, compared to an average of
4,835 during the preceding five years. Five of the 20 most destructive
wildfires in the state's history burned between October and December 2017.
In the case of these Northern California wildfires, we saw an
unprecedented confluence of weather-related conditions, including: years
of drought resulting in millions of dead trees, a record-setting wet
winter that spurred the growth of vegetation that then became abundant
fuel after record-setting heat during the summer months, very low humidity
and very high winds.
To address the growing threats posed by wildfires and extreme weather, and
in light of the wildfires throughout our state last year, PG&E has
launched the Community Wildfire Safety Program to help keep our customers
and communities safe. Among the key components of the new program are:
Wildfire Safety Operations Center: A state of the art operations center
that will monitor extreme weather and fire threats in real time and in
coordination with our safety partners.
Weather Stations Network: A network of weather stations throughout high
fire-risk areas to better monitor growing extreme weather conditions and
predict where wildfires may occur.
Fire Defense Zones: Augmenting our already rigorous vegetation management
program to create new fire defense zones near power lines in high fire
threat areas.
Public Safety Power Shutoff: As a last resort, a program to proactively
turn off electric power for safety when extreme fire danger conditions
occur, while helping customers prepare and providing early warning
notification, when and where possible.
We Must Work Together to Address This Challenge
The state, first responders and California's utilities are all in
agreement that we must work together to prevent and respond to wildfires
and enhance infrastructure resiliency.
This includes solutions that go beyond utility practices such as
improvements in forestry management and in building codes. In addition, we
must address the availability and affordability of insurance coverage, and
we believe it is imperative to reform California's unsustainable policies
regarding wildfire liability.
California is one of the only states in the country where the courts have
applied inverse condemnation liability to events associated with investor-
owned utility equipment. This means PG&E could be liable for property
damages and attorneys' fees even if we followed established inspection and
safety rules.
Liability regardless of negligence undermines the financial health of the
state's utilities, discourages investment in California and has the
potential to materially impact the ability of utilities to access the
capital markets to fund utility operations and California's bold clean
energy vision.
Reforming inverse condemnation would not absolve utilities from
responsibility. Anyone harmed by these tragic wildfires has the ability to
pursue a negligence claim in court. Furthermore, the CPUC, which regulates
utilities, has the authority to investigate and evaluate a company's
conduct and performance and deny the recovery of costs if such conduct did
not meet the state's high standards.
We are committed to advocating with legislative leaders and policymakers
across the state on comprehensive legislative solutions for all
Californians, as we collectively seek to meet the challenge of climate
change, and position the California economy for success.
--
Donald J. Trump, 304 electoral votes to 227, defeated compulsive liar in
denial Hillary Rodham Clinton on December 19th, 2016. The clown car
parade of the democrat party ran out of gas and got run over by a Trump
truck.
Congratulations President Trump. Thank you for cleaning up the disaster
of the Obama presidency.
Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp.
ObamaCare is a total 100% failure and no lie that can be put forth by its
supporters can dispute that.
Obama jobs, the result of ObamaCare. 12-15 working hours a week at minimum
wage, no benefits and the primary revenue stream for ObamaCare. It can't
be funded with money people don't have, yet liberals lie about how great
it is.
Obama increased total debt from $10 trillion to $20 trillion in the eight
years he was in office, and sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood queer
liberal democrat donors.
wildfires/3579377/
MENDOCINO, Calif. (KGO) -- Cal Fire made an announcement Friday
determining the cause of nearly all of the North Bay Wildfires, which
broke out on October 8, 2017 and burned more than 200,000 acres and
claimed 44 lives.
On Friday, Cal Fire said 12 of the wildfires that broke out in Mendocino,
Humboldt, Butte, Sonoma, Lake, and Napa Counties were caused by "electric
power and distribution lines, conductors and the failure of power poles."
The October 2017 fire siege involved more than 170 fires and burned at
least 245,000 acres in Northern California. About 11,000 firefighters from
17 states and Australia helped battle the blazes.
CAL FIRE investigators were dispatched to the fires last year and
immediately began working to determine their origin and cause. Cal Fire
investigators continue to investigate the remaining 2017 fires, both in
October and December, and will release additional reports as they are
completed.
The only fire not included is the Tubbs Fire, because Cal Fire says that
report is not out yet. The Tubbs fire burned nearly 37,000 acres of Napa
and Sonoma County.
The Redwood Valley Fire in Mendocino County scorched more than 36,000
acres, destroyed more than 300 homes, and killed at least nine people.
They include the Shepherd family's two teenage children, burned while
trying to escape the flames. Cal Fire says trees fell onto PG&E power
lines, and sparked this fire.
Nearby, the Sulphur Fire in Lake County, was caused when PG&E power lines
hit the ground. It's the same finding that Cal Fire made last month with
regard to the October wildfires in Butte and Nevada Counties.
Cal Fire determined in three of those four fires, PG&E had failed to trim
back trees located near power lines, as mandated by state code.
PG&E already faces more than 100 lawsuits in these fires. If Cal Fire
holds the utility responsible in the Wine Country, where more than 8, 000
homes were destroyed, analysts say the 112-year old company may not
survive the financial hit.
State lawmaker Jerry Hill has already said if Cal Fire blames the North
Bay wildfires on PG&E negligence, he'll try to break up the utility.
Hill represents San Bruno, where an old PG&E gas pipeline exploded in
2010, killing eight people.
PG&E released a statement saying:
The safety of our customers, their families and the communities we serve
is our most important job. The loss of life, homes and businesses in these
extraordinary wildfires is simply heartbreaking, and we remain focused on
helping communities recover and rebuild.
Programs Overall Met State's High Standards
We look forward to the opportunity to carefully review the Cal Fire
reports to understand the agency's perspectives.
Based on the information we have so far, we continue to believe our
overall programs met our state's high standards.
For example, PG&E meets or exceeds regulatory requirements for pole
integrity management, using a comprehensive database to manage multiple
patrol and inspection schedules of our more than two million poles.
Similarly, under PG&E's industry-leading Vegetation Management Program, we
inspect and monitor every PG&E overhead electric transmission and
distribution line each year, with some locations patrolled multiple times.
We also prune or remove approximately 1.4 million trees annually.
Following Governor Brown's January 2014 Drought State of Emergency
Proclamation and the California Public Utilities Commission's Resolution
ESRB-4, PG&E added enhanced measures to address areas particularly
affected by drought and bark beetles including increased foot and aerial
patrols along power lines in high fire-risk areas, removal of hundreds of
thousands of dead or dying tree, and daily aerial fire detection patrols
during high fire season to improve fire spotting and speed of fire
response.
'New Normal' Requires New Solutions'
With that said, years of drought, extreme heat and 129 million dead trees
have created a "new normal" for our state that requires comprehensive new
solutions.
Extreme weather is increasing the number of large wildfires and the length
of the wildfire season in California. According to CAL FIRE, in 2017
alone, CAL FIRE confronted 7,117 wildfires, compared to an average of
4,835 during the preceding five years. Five of the 20 most destructive
wildfires in the state's history burned between October and December 2017.
In the case of these Northern California wildfires, we saw an
unprecedented confluence of weather-related conditions, including: years
of drought resulting in millions of dead trees, a record-setting wet
winter that spurred the growth of vegetation that then became abundant
fuel after record-setting heat during the summer months, very low humidity
and very high winds.
To address the growing threats posed by wildfires and extreme weather, and
in light of the wildfires throughout our state last year, PG&E has
launched the Community Wildfire Safety Program to help keep our customers
and communities safe. Among the key components of the new program are:
Wildfire Safety Operations Center: A state of the art operations center
that will monitor extreme weather and fire threats in real time and in
coordination with our safety partners.
Weather Stations Network: A network of weather stations throughout high
fire-risk areas to better monitor growing extreme weather conditions and
predict where wildfires may occur.
Fire Defense Zones: Augmenting our already rigorous vegetation management
program to create new fire defense zones near power lines in high fire
threat areas.
Public Safety Power Shutoff: As a last resort, a program to proactively
turn off electric power for safety when extreme fire danger conditions
occur, while helping customers prepare and providing early warning
notification, when and where possible.
We Must Work Together to Address This Challenge
The state, first responders and California's utilities are all in
agreement that we must work together to prevent and respond to wildfires
and enhance infrastructure resiliency.
This includes solutions that go beyond utility practices such as
improvements in forestry management and in building codes. In addition, we
must address the availability and affordability of insurance coverage, and
we believe it is imperative to reform California's unsustainable policies
regarding wildfire liability.
California is one of the only states in the country where the courts have
applied inverse condemnation liability to events associated with investor-
owned utility equipment. This means PG&E could be liable for property
damages and attorneys' fees even if we followed established inspection and
safety rules.
Liability regardless of negligence undermines the financial health of the
state's utilities, discourages investment in California and has the
potential to materially impact the ability of utilities to access the
capital markets to fund utility operations and California's bold clean
energy vision.
Reforming inverse condemnation would not absolve utilities from
responsibility. Anyone harmed by these tragic wildfires has the ability to
pursue a negligence claim in court. Furthermore, the CPUC, which regulates
utilities, has the authority to investigate and evaluate a company's
conduct and performance and deny the recovery of costs if such conduct did
not meet the state's high standards.
We are committed to advocating with legislative leaders and policymakers
across the state on comprehensive legislative solutions for all
Californians, as we collectively seek to meet the challenge of climate
change, and position the California economy for success.
--
Donald J. Trump, 304 electoral votes to 227, defeated compulsive liar in
denial Hillary Rodham Clinton on December 19th, 2016. The clown car
parade of the democrat party ran out of gas and got run over by a Trump
truck.
Congratulations President Trump. Thank you for cleaning up the disaster
of the Obama presidency.
Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp.
ObamaCare is a total 100% failure and no lie that can be put forth by its
supporters can dispute that.
Obama jobs, the result of ObamaCare. 12-15 working hours a week at minimum
wage, no benefits and the primary revenue stream for ObamaCare. It can't
be funded with money people don't have, yet liberals lie about how great
it is.
Obama increased total debt from $10 trillion to $20 trillion in the eight
years he was in office, and sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood queer
liberal democrat donors.