In a chilling replay of events that led to last year’s Camp Fire, PG&E reported a malfunction on a high-voltage electrical transmission line minutes before the Kincade Fire started in Sonoma County on Wednesday night.
Even though the equipment malfunction and ignition point were in an area covered by the utility’s “Public Safety Power Shutoffs” (PSPS), that safety precaution applies only to smaller distribution lines, and not high-voltage transmission lines.
A final determination has yet to be made about the cause of the Kincade Fire, but it looks like signs point to PG&E equipment … again.