Greater Orange News Service

Southern California Edison is reporting that 36,000 customers in the three Southern California counties impacted by the fires, Orange, Riverside and Santa Barbara, have lost service at some point since Thursday night because of the impact of high winds and wildfires on electricity equipment. Outages have lasted from a few minutes to several hours.

The Corona area fire burned underneath two of SCE's high-voltage lines, temporarily causing them to shut down and affecting some 1,200 customers. Though the fires have temporarily affected some of Edison's high-voltage transmission lines, the utility has reported that it has sufficient back-up resources to meet projected customer needs. Sunday is expected to be another near-record hot day and electricity demand is expected to be high.

With the fires still raging on Saturday, no estimates were available for when all affected SCE customers will have power restored.

Anaheim, Brea, Corona, Montecito and Santa Barbara, Palos Verdes and Yorba Linda have been the hardest hit in service interuptions.

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