3,336 acres. Fourteen structures were burned, including Castle Kashan, classrooms at Our Lady of Malibu and Webster schools, and the clocktower at Colony Village. Thirty-six vehicles burned, including a sedan on PCH where four panicked people were pulled to safety just as their evacuation route was blocked by a wall of flames.
I was working as a journalist and covered the fire. Later, I was in San Francisco doing some volunteer work on LNG imports before the Public Utilities Commission. I had occasion to review the PUC’s safety investigation into the Malibu fire, and was alarmed that little was happening. I stopped “covering” this news and filed to become a citizen intervener in the case. At about that time, the state beefed up its case and put some really good prosecutors on it. I had a seat at a table as they conducted investigations. I had to sign a confidentiality agreement, because the information the state was uncovering could be very valuable in the simultaneous civil lawsuits for something like $500 million in damages. What I learned in the closed-door depositions scares me to death. It should scare you.
There are thousands of power poles upwind of Malibu nearing 60 or 70 years in age. In the last decade or two, they have been heavily laden with new communications cables and antennae for the cellular industry.
Next time you drive Malibu Canyon or PCH, look for the heavy thick black cables under the power lines. Look also at the bent, warped poles, the loose guy wires, the obvious signs of weathering and splintering. Imagine the thousands of pounds of wind load and gravity these poles bear.
Worse, the pole that toppled in 2007 and ignited Malibu had significant termite damage which Edison had known of. It was leaning and so badly overloaded that I wonder if it had been held up by the cables stretching to the next poles: streetlights, cellphone antennas, a huge electric switch for Edison. This pole could barely stand up in fair weather. Southern California Edison installed the pole in 1957, and as an investor-owned utility it was guaranteed a regulated profit on that expense. Years later, cable and cell companies came along, and state requires them to buy access to the poles from SCE. It is not clear to me where these new profits go.
Over and over again, SCE sold pole access to ATT, Next G, Sprint, Verizon. Evidence in the PUC investigation shows shoddy engineering planning was done, if any, to see if the poles could hold the weight. My favorite story is about the “regular pole inspections” that are required by the state. Remember that cellular company that ran all those ads showing an army of technicians and trucks behind the spokes-geek with glasses? That company did not have any field pole safety people on its payroll in California. No trucks. No engineers. No army of workers. It contracted out for everything, and its inspection program was, “we tell our contractors to look for problems as they drive to work.”
Your state government allowed this to occur. The PUC is led by a former SCE president who was recruited by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to make sure California didn’t run out of electricity, like before. Safety was an admitted afterthought. Then a neighborhood in San Bruno blew up, because PUC-regulated natural gas lines were criminally shoddy. That got people’s attention. The PUC, to its credit, is now very serious about electric and gas line safety.
So, PUC prosecutors are now asking for $99.2 million in fines for the companies that caused the 2007 Malibu Canyon fire. A PUC judge is recommending that three of the companies – the little guys – pay $4 million each. NextG still faces a trial for its $25 million fine, and the big culprit, Edison, faces trial over a $49 million fine.
Where will this money go? Most of it to the state treasurer in Sacramento. $5.1 million will go to two causes, including a statistically valid random sample of poles in the Edison service area, to see how big the problem is. And it seems big: 211 poles fell over in a December windstorm at San Gabriel, and a third of those were overloaded. Malibu will get a strengthening and repair of power poles along 3.4 miles of Malibu Canyon Road – strengthening to above current standards.
A victory? Yes and no. All that money should find bad poles in our region, where the damage and disruption occurred. Then make the utilities fix them – out of their profits, not our rates. And, a parallel investigation that I’ve also joined is looking at whether the existing PUC pole standards are safe enough in fire-weather zones, like Malibu. Is it a good idea to spend millions on strengthening poles in Malibu Canyon when it may be safer to reroute them?
There are other dangers, too. These fire zone maps could be used by power companies to shut off electricity to risk areas during Santa Anas, like San Diego Gas and Electric once tried.
I’ll keep you all posted.