Leer en Español
Several floods recorded in northern California due to the impact of heavy rains left around 380,000 homes and businesses without electricity this weekend.
According to data from PG&E, the country’s largest electricity provider, and poweroutage.us, which records the number of outages nationwide, 175,000 buildings were still without power early this Monday.
In a statement, PG&E said that the Bay Area, where San Francisco is located, was the most affected by these power outages, especially San Mateo, Santa Clara and Marin counties.
However, it warned that customers in other counties further south of that city could face “possible power outages” throughout Monday, depending on how the storm evolves.
Flooding knocked down some power poles in the region, caused mudslides and overflowed rivers in Napa and Sonoma counties. These circumstances also resulted in evacuations of thousands of people in San Francisco, Santa Barbara, San Rafael and Santa Rosa.
In addition, local authorities decided to close a freeway and several roads due to mudslides, including Plumas County, where the Dixie Fire, the second-largest in California’s history, left a lot of debris.
The alert about these mudslides went so far that the National Weather Service (NWS) in Sacramento, the state capital, advised several residents on Sunday to take shelter “on the highest floor of their home” rather than trying to escape.
“If you are near fire debris it may be too late to evacuate: Do not try to cut across a debris flow and take shelter on the highest floor of your home,” the NWS warned on its Twitter account.
