Some SCE customers still without power in San Bernardino Mountains

A few hundred customers remained without electricity Tuesday, Dec. 3, in the Crestline-Lake Arrowhead area of the San Bernardino Mountains as utility crews worked to reach customers tucked into areas where last week’s snowstorm brought down power lines.

Southern California Edison said that by 5 p.m. the number of customers without power was 423, down from 1,300 earlier in the day and 1,580 Monday night.

More customers could expect power to be restored Tuesday evening, said Southern California Edison spokeswoman Mary Ann Milbourn, but others may not be back on line until Wednesday.

Some in the area have not had power since Thursday, after a powerful snowstorm rolled through and brought down trees and branches that in turn snapped power lines and damaged other equipment.

At the height of the outages 24,600 mountain customers were without power, and SCE supplied firewood  distributed by the San Bernardino County Fire Department, for residents to stay warm during freezing nighttime temperatures.

Some still-waiting customers “might be on a circuit with a lot of damage, or off the beaten path and on streets that may not be plowed yet” for crews to get access, Milbourn said.

“We have worked in snow and weather before, but I think this particular storm caught everyone by surprise, by the amount of snow,” she said.

Another storm was moving into the area Tuesday night and expected to last through Wednesday, although forecast by the National Weather Service to not drop as much snow.

“We are expecting this to be mostly a rain event,” Milbourn said.

The National Weather Service office in San Diego on Tuesday afternoon issued a flash flood watch for much of the Inland area west of the desert, including the San Bernardino Mountains, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday.