Only a sprinkling of customers remained without power in Long Beach as crews continued to make permanent repairs to an electrical distribution network damaged during a series of underground vault fires, a Southern California Edison spokesman said.
Officials had said earlier that power was restored to all but 200 of the 4,800 customer accounts blacked out as a result of the fires, which were reported at 3:40 p.m. Wednesday.
The vast majority of those 200 were back online by Saturday afternoon, with only a handful left without power or other issues with their service.
Some of the still-affected customers were having problems related to circuit breakers, according to SCE spokesman Robert Villegas, who told City News Service that anyone experiencing difficulties to call the utility’s customer service line at (800) 655-4555 for assistance resetting breakers and troubleshooting other problems.
Although the local network is back up and running, Villegas said crews continue to work on permanent repairs and would likely be at it for a week or two.
Meanwhile, city officials counted 120 emergency calls over the 54 hours of power outage in the downtown area.
No injuries were reported as a result of the fires, but some cast-iron manhole covers were deformed as they blasted into the air with explosive force and came to earth amid midday vehicular and pedestrian traffic in the city’s downtown streets.
— City News Service