Officials ready if lights go out: Procedures in place to handle blackouts

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Officials ready if lights go out: Procedures in place to handle blackouts By Ralph Montaño and Kevin Yamamura Bee Staff Writers (Published Dec. 14, 2000)

If the lights go out in Yolo County, Sgt. Larry Cecchettini will be ready. He'll leave his desk job, don the patrol uniform and hit the streets. There will be hundreds of burglar alarms going off, he said. There always are when the power goes out.

"We treat them all as a high priority," said Cecchettini. "Because you could go to 99 alarms and have nothing and the 100th one could be the real thing."

Across the Sacramento region, law enforcement agencies and fire departments say they are prepared for possible rolling blackouts ordered by the California Independent System Operator. They know exactly what they are going to do should the lights go out and the heat switch off.

"All of the preparation was done last year when we were getting ready for the Y2K thing," said Michael Boyle, assistant director with the Placer County Office of Emergency Services (OES).

The emergency response handbooks have been pulled from shelves, and protocol has been reviewed. But the public still needs to be reassured.

People have been calling fire station phones non-stop concerned with what they should do, said Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District Capt. Patrick Ellis.

On Wednesday, he and other public safety officials across Sacramento County discussed how residents can ensure their own safety.

"The most important thing is to stay calm," said Sacramento County Sheriff's Sgt. James Lewis. "Because, after all, it's not as if (the blackout) will be going for a long time. In an hour or less, the lights will come back on."

Area law enforcement and fire departments have plenty of practice handling power outages.

"We've had storms hit where people were without power for a week or more, and that's certainly a lot worse," said El Dorado County Sheriff's Sgt. Marty Hackett, the county's OES coordinator. "But that's why we're all waiting to see what happens in a rolling power outage. We've never had a rolling blackout, so I can't really say (what it's like)."

Rolling blackouts are a last-ditch effort by the California Independent System Operator to balance an over-taxed electrical grid. The ISO has never ordered a statewide blackout, although it did order one in the Bay Area in June.

Blackouts occur throughout the year from flooding, fires, high wind or damaged power poles. Knowing about one ahead of time will be a blessing, said Sacramento Fire Capt. Don Braziel.

"It will make it easier," he said.

A Sacramento fire captain talks to the California Independent System Operator every day, Braziel said. If there is a chance of the power going down, the captain notifies dispatchers. An emergency commander also is designated and sets up an office in the dispatch center. From there, fire resources across the county will be allocated according to the problems that arise, Braziel said.

Because the power will only be out for a short time, Braziel said he does not expect any evacuations.

"By the time we could get them evacuated, the power will be back on," Braziel said. "But we will be in touch with the county's care facilities, just in case."

Authorities said they have reassurances from power companies that downtown Sacramento and its high-rise buildings will not be affected by a rolling blackout because of the high number of elevators.

And malls, such as Arden Fair, have their own plans and power generators, said General Manager Chris Facas. Like many agencies in the area, the mall will have advanced warning of a blackout. Although stores will not be able to stay open for business, people will have enough light from generators to leave the stores and get to their cars.

"If it's going to be short, we'll just close the stores but allow people to stay until it's over," Facas said.

Not everyone is so confident of an advanced warning.

"PG&E is hoping to tell us in advance. Notice I use the word 'hoping,' " said Davis Police Lt. Don Hopkins. "We may be told when it's dark and the phone rings."

But there is no doubt what to do when the lights go out, Hopkins said.

"For us, our main priority is prime intersections without stoplights," Hopkins said. "With weather changing and no stoplights, there could be a problem."

Sacramento Police Lt. Sam Somers said the city doesn't have the resources to direct traffic during an outage.

"People are going to have to show a little patience," he said. "We are all in a hurry this time of year, but you have to treat each lighted intersection as a four-way stop."

There are no plans by authorities to notify the public about a pending blackout.

"We've been struggling with that," said Marilyn Bartell, spokeswoman for the city of Roseville. "We have the cable channel and a Web site. But the chances that we would have enough time to get it out before the power went off is kind of slim."

So residents need to be careful and be aware of the hazards of heating or lighting their home.

"We've had two fires in the Sacramento area related to candles," said Sacramento Metropolitan Fire Capt. Dan Haverty. "We don't want to see any more."

Better to pull a couple extra blankets out of the closet and wait it out, Haverty added.

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-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), December 15, 2000


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