Whipping Winds Bring Down Trees, Cause Power Outages Across LA
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) — Gusty winds wreaked havoc across Los Angeles Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, bringing down trees and power lines, and leaving thousands of homes without electricity.
Overnight, power outages peaked at 42,000, according to the LA Department of Water and Power, which had crews working around the clock to restore electricity across the city. The hardest hit communities were Hollywood Hills, South LA, Koreatown, Mid-Wilshire, Silver Lake/Los Feliz, and Mar Vista.
Outages are now down to 33,000 customers affected. Overnight, outages peaked at 42,000. If you are without power, please know our crews are working hard to get your service restored.
— LADWP (@LADWP) April 10, 2019
Officials said 33,000 customers were without power at 5 a.m., but by 11 a.m., power had been restored to 20,000 homes. Those still without power by Wednesday afternoon were told to plan to be without power by at least Thursday morning.
LADWP also says there are 15 areas with wires still down, including across the 405 Freeway at Charnock Road. Those lines are sagging and need repairs that could disrupt traffic and cause delays.
The strong, blustery winds overnight brought large trees down from the Westside to the San Fernando Valley.
In Westwood, an 85-foot tree was tipped over and left leaning on a five-story apartment building being renovated. The scaffolding outside the building appeared to help buffer the impact, but the building has been yellow-tagged, limiting entry.
The National Weather Service said gusts in the Westwood area reached 50 mph.
"It's pretty mind blowing that winds could be that strong," UCLA student Tyrone McCauley said.
Cars also fell victim to large trees overnight. One large tree smashed into a sedan parked on McKinley Avenue in South LA, shattering the windows, damaging the van behind it. The tree's branches reached all the way across the street and were left pushing up against a metal fence.
On San Vicente and Cochran in the Mid-Wilshire area, another large tree came down onto a white van and nearly sheared it in half. The tree was wrapped in yellow caution tape until crews can come to clean up the mess.
The winds are expected to taper out by Wednesday afternoon.