SMUD Staffs Up For Major Storm

Chris Capra is with the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. He says the company has staffed up its line crews and its customer service center in anticipation of the storm that will bring high wind gusts of up to 65 miles an hour.

"We can have poles that snap," says Capra, "we can have lines that slap into each other and cause brief outages that are related to fuses and those are an easy fix, however when we start getting into damage is when problems occur and outages are longer in duration and may affect more customers in a given area."

Capra says there is a priority list in dealing with power outages.

"Downed power lines and public safety hazards like that are our first priority," explains Capra. "Then we look at flood pumps because that can be an issue with getting water out of a given area. We want to make sure flood pumps are running.  Then our third and fourth priorities are the larger and smaller groups of outages."

Capra advises making sure you have plenty of batteries on hand for flashlights-- also some canned food and a manual can opener. And to make sure your cell phone is charged and an extra cell phone battery, plus a battery operated radio. Capra says if your power goes out-- go outside to check and see if the neighbors are out as well. If so-- call SMUD 1-888-456-SMUD.