As smoke from the utility company’s latest fire swirled nearby, PG&E CEO Patti Pope announced the “Make It Safe, Bury the Lines” program, the Chico ER reports. “We were going to make this announcement in a couple months when we had a little more meat on the bones, but we couldn’t wait, particularly given the proximity to the Dixie Fire and the emotional toll that it has on all of us,” Poppe told the Chico ER. “We need you to know we are working night and day to solve this incredible problem.
“We are committing today to undertake one of the largest infrastructure projects in the history of our state. We are committing to bury 10,000 miles of lines, starting in our highest fire threat districts, in our highest fire risk areas.”
The Dixie Fire began last Tuesday, ended that first day estimated at one to two acres in size. By the next morning, the fire had grown to 1,200 acres. This morning, it covered over 85,000 acres, with 15 percent containment (all along the southwest edge closest to the origin point). By Thursday morning it had expanded to nearly 104,000 acres, becoming the state’s second official megafire this year.
The fire’s origin was only a few miles away from the Camp Fire origin point along PG&E transmission lines in the Feather River Canyon. “PG&E said a repair man responding to a circuit outage on July 13, “spotted blown fuses in a conductor atop a pole, a tree leaning into the conductor and fire at the base of the tree,” in a report to the California Public Utilities Commission … ‘PG&E says the worker wasn’t able to get to the scene until nearly 10 hours later because a bridge on the road to the line was out of service. When he got there he saw that two fuses had been blown, that a tree was leaning on the line and that a fire was burning near the tree.’ Ted Goldberg continued to tweet, ‘PG&E says its workers alerted Cal Fire, which by that time had already gotten a report from one of its own crews and had already assigned air tankers and helicopters to respond.’”