Climate Changed

PG&E Is Already Starting Fires Again, Just Weeks Into the Season

  • Fires have already broken out tied to the company’s equipment
  • Shortage of tree trimmers, land access issues hamper work
Firefighters participate in a controlled burn training in San Rafael on June 19.Photographer: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
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Just a few weeks into California’s dry summer season, fires linked to PG&E Corp. have already started to break out.

More than 2,000 acres burned in Monterey County this week, with power lines blamed as the cause. Earlier this month, a transformer burst into flames in MarinBloomberg Terminal County, north of San Francisco, and ignited a brush fire. In San Jose, falling PG&E wires may have scorched a house and an acre of land.