Toll From Massive Wind Storm Plagues DWP Customers

LOS ANGELES, CA — Los Angeles Department of Water and Power crews continued making progress Thursday to restore power to people and businesses affected by this week's wind storm, reporting that only 1,000 customers were still without electricity.

That figure was down from 5,000 reported early Thursday morning. Nearly 100,000 customers lost power due to what DWP officials called "the worse wind storm to hit the city's power grid since 2011."

Since the start of the high winds Tuesday afternoon, crews have restored power to more than 97,000 customers who were knocked offline, according to a statement from the LADWP.

The areas still most affected by lingering outages were eastern Hollywood and Koreatown, along with some neighborhoods south of the Hollywood Hills.

Customers were advised earlier this week to expect to be without power for between 12 to 24 hours.

DWP representative Sylvia Beltran said it is crucial for repair crews to determine the cause of an outage affecting a particular circuit before attempting to restore electrical service.

When a crew encounters a downed power line, the parameters of that repair are self-evident, Beltran said. However, circuits can shut down for various other reasons, and the cause must be diagnosed before a crew can re- energize the circuit safely in order to prevent creating further damage, she said.

A downed tree was reported about 3:30 a.m. Thursday near the intersection of Bundy Drive and Goshen Street in the Brentwood area of Los Angeles. The tree fell on at least one vehicle and was leaning against an apartment complex, but no injuries or evacuations were reported.

About 40 Southern California Edison customers in Los Angeles County were without power due to winds, according to SCE's online Outage Map.

City News Service