SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) — A weekend weather system will send temperatures soaring, humidity levels dropping and stirring up bone-dry, hot northeastern winds, triggering a Red Flag fire warning across wildfire-ravaged Northern California and an alert from Pacific Gas & Electric of possible preventative power blackouts.
The National Weather Service said the Red Flag warning will go into effect at 9 p.m. Saturday and end at 8 a.m. Monday.
“East winds will come off the Sierra they will make a beeline towards Mt Diablo and the North Bay,” NWS forecasters said. “Again there will be no humidity recovery Sunday night and the models show east winds driving all the way to the coast and offshore.”
“Any fires that develop will spread rapidly in the hot, dry and windy weather,” forecasters added.
The withering northerly and easterly winds are common in the fall and historically signaled the arrival of fire season in California. But the fires have come early this year as the state has already seen more than 8,000 wildfires scorch 5,600 square miles.
“We’ve already had three fire seasons in one year,” said Cal Fire spokeswoman Lynne Tolmachoff.
Most of the loss has occurred since Aug. 15, when remnants of Tropical Storm Fausto off Mexico surged up the coast and unleashed thousands of dry lightning strikes that ignited massive complexes of multiple fires around the San Francisco Bay Area.
Those and subsequent conflagrations in the Sierra Nevada and elsewhere have left 26 people dead and destroyed more than 6,700 homes and other structures, according to Cal Fire.
The latest round of threatening weather triggered a warning Thursday night from PG&E that households may lose electricity this weekend as a result of Public Safety Power Shutoffs.
“We now have a PSPS Watch,” PG&E spokespersonb Tamar Sarkissian said in a release. “A PSPS Watch indicates that PG&E has activated our Emergency Operations Center as there is a reasonable chance of executing a PSPS for public safety in a given geographic zone due to a combination of adverse weather and dry fuel conditions.”
Currently, no San Francisco Bay Area customers appeared to be in the potential shutoff zones. Those shutoffs would impact customers in the Sierra and northeastern California.
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September 25, 2020 at 10:12PM
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Triple Digital Heat Expected Over Weekend; High Fire Danger, Possible Preventive Power Outages - CBS San Francisco
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