Santa Anas Still Blowing But Nothing Like Monday
Written by 991KBU on October 16, 2018
The National Weather Service predicts Santa Anas will consolidate and return this morning … but be about 10 to 15 miles an hour less severe as yesterday’s big blow.
The forecast calls for North to northeast winds 20 to 30 mph with gusts to 45 mph.
At 10 AM … winds were already gusting to 45 Miles Per Hour In the hills above Western Malibu.
Wind gusts were approaching 40 mi./h in the hills above Las Flores Canyon.
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Malibu went to sleep with four power outages last night … lingering from yesterday’s moderate Sanat Ana wind storm.
At one point . nearly 80 percent of Malibu was blacked out … the entire city except Point Due and Paradise Cove.
At the peak of the windstorm … nearly 5000 customers were without electricity.
As of now …
We’re still getting reports about scattered power outages in the Malibu Park neighborhood … above Zuma Beach.
SMMUSD tells us as of 5:45am … power is on at all 4 Malibu public schools, and they are awaiting final confirmation – but it looks like a normal school day.
As of sunrise … 141 houses remained blacked out in the Decker Canyon and Lechusa areas, west of Malibu.
KBUU was off air from 10 pm -12 mid to allow neighbors to sleep without generator noise. FM programming resumed when SCE got power back to Seastar/Surfside area at 11:45pm.
All signals appear to be up on PCH.
Malibu residents we talked to last night at Pavilions had mixed reactions.
NEWSCART 77868 WINDS REAXN VARIOUS VOICES
WOMAN #1: “It’s horrible, it’s horrible.
“Plus, there’s no warning.
“My food’s going bad.
“And I just bought food that’s gotta be frozen.
“And I think the power is still out at my house.”
MAN: “ As a third world comparison, I don’t think I would do that, because we are way out here in Malibu, and the winds were pushing 30 miles an hour today.
“So, the only time I see the power out is when the winds get high, which can happen out here, living on the coast.”
WOMAN #2: “I’ve got solar-powered backup, for my phone.
“I have flashlights, and I happen to have a gas stove and oven, and a barbecue inside.
“So that’snot terrible.
REPORTER: “This is the second power outage in 10m days week.
“Does this sort of make you wonder what is happening?”
WOMAN #2: “Yes. I think Edison flipped their switch.
As for the next few hours …. expect winds to consolidate and start blowing again.
Strong …. but ot as strong as yesterday.
Today’s peak winds will be about 15 miles per hour less than yesterday.
Normal weather for the rest of the week …. and then another Santa Ana this weekend.
But the National Weather Service says this weekend will see a “Wet Santa Ana” … whatever that is
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So what went wrong yesterday?
Peak winds of 50 miles an hour left dozens of locations with power lines failing.
Transmission lines … a high voltage line that delivers electricity to Malibu from disatnt power plants …. they apparently failed in Malibu Canyon.
Edsion had dozens of repairs to make …. before the liens could eb turned back on.
Edison was overwhelmed yesterday.
Their public relations departmmetn said they had no idea what the extent of repiars needed were.
Estimates of when power could be restored oscillated wildly.
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Malibu’s Planning Commission meeting was cancelled … due to the power outage.
After school activities were cancelled at the schools.
Classes were held in darkened classrooms … or outdoors.
The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District asked L-A sheriff’s deputies to direct traffic at blank signals … but many of the signals in western Malibu never went out.
