SMUD prioritizes public safety hazards before outages as some customers still without power
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) - It has been an all-hands-on-deck effort as crews with Sacramento Municipal Utility District continue to restore power for thousands of homes. As of Tuesday, officials say power has been restored to 95% of customers, but there are still about 12,000 people without power.
SMUD officials tell CBS13 that crews are overwhelmed and stretched thin. They say this kind of weather event is unprecedented. As a result, the agency called for help outside of the county.
Crews are coming from as far north as Redding and as far south as Los Angeles to assist SMUD crews.
Residents living near the corner of 60th Avenue and Cromwell Way are among the 12,000 customers without power Tuesday. Neighbors say they are frustrated and feel they have been forgotten. However, SMUD officials say they are working as fast as they can.
SMUD prioritizes its response in a four-tiered system. Their top priority is to respond to public safety hazards. Second, they respond to hospitals and city flood pumps. Third, they focus on outages that impact the most people. Lastly, they focus their efforts on smaller scattered outages.
However, this week, poor weather conditions have also slowed down their response.
"When it's really windy, our guys cannot go up in buckets. It's just not safe. We're being hampered by flooding. Sometimes we can't even get crews in there because of the inaccessibility," spokesperson Lindsay Vanlaningham said.
Vanlaningham also says crews are working 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They have already replaced a record number of power poles and about 1,800 transmission lines.
SMUD is encouraging customers to not cut apart fallen trees and stay clear of downed power lines until crews have inspected them.
