PG&E

Error in PG&E's Outage Alert System in Berkeley

Hundreds of Berkeley residents were left without power Tuesday morning, but an erroneous report initially indicated the outage was affecting thousands, according to a PG&E spokeswoman.

The outage, which occurred around 9 a.m., initially affected about 650 customers, PG&E spokeswoman Tamar Sarkissian said.

Residents, however, had been alerted by an automatic telephone service provided by PG&E that about 70,000 customers were without power.

That number turned out to be inaccurate, according to Sarkissian.

"We're looking into our system that reports power outages and why it inaccurately reported that number," she said.

PG&E is also looking into what caused the original outage that affected the 650 customers. Those customers had their power restored by about 9:30 a.m., Sarkissian said.

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