Thousands Left without Power in Venice

LOS ANGELES, CA -- Tens of thousands of Los Angeles Department of Water and Power customers, many in the Venice area, lost electrical service Monday in the aftermath of overnight rain and scattered transformer fires.

Problems were reported in about a dozen areas in the city.

The utility initially reported about 14,000 customers without power, but as of 11:30 a.m., the number had increased to around 24,000. The hardest-hit community was Venice, where about 7,900 customers were without electrical service, the DWP reported.

As of 4 p.m., 17,000 customers remained without service, according to the DWP, which reported that more than 27,000 customers had service restored since the rain started.

Crews would work around the clock to restore service to those remaining without power, according to the DWP.

The causes of the outages were under investigation, but city fire crews responded to several transformer fires.

"Some of the most frequent causes of power outages during rain storms are dried palm fronds, tree branches and other debris that fall and make contact with power lines, according to a DWP statement

This is particularly true with the first rain after an extended period of time."

City News Service