North Bay still contending with outages and cleaning up from storm
FAIRFAX, Calif. - In the North Bay, Pacific Gas and Electric crews are still grappling with outages across the region after this weekend's powerful storm. Some areas aren't expected to get their power back until Tuesday evening.
In Fairfax, Mia Pritts eyed the storm damage across from her home in Fairfax, where a large tree limb came down on a car port with two cars inside.
"The wind started gusting really strong, and so we were looking up, and we watched the whole thing just come down and shatter the car port," said Pritts.
Pritts said she was still shaken, and grateful no one was hurt.
The storm also knocked out power to a large section of Fairfax, where some local businesses eyed food that they'd likely have to toss out.
In one San Rafael neighborhood that lost power, most customers were understanding about the outage.
The trees are, "trimmed almost every year by PG&E so I feel like the utilities do the best job they can," said one neighbor.
Still there was frustration over what one customer described as a lack of communication from the utility provider.
"We’re hooked up with them. They’re supposed to give us notifications, and they can’t seem to give us any indication of when power might be turned back on," said neighbor Steve Summers.
Meantime, Tad Jacobs, who owns and operates Treemasters tree service in San Rafael, says the region was likely not out of the woods just yet.
"A lot of the trees have been de-stabilized with the winds last night and all the rains that have saturated the soil and there could just be small fine roots hanging on holding a tree up," said Jacobs.
Jacobs said tell tale signs that your tree could be at risk include, "if you see any big cracks in the trunk of the tree or fractures in the soil at the base of the tree. That’s something that you’re going to want to alert your arborist about and get them to take a look at right away."