PG&E conducts helicopter patrols for wildfire safety in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara County

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) have begun conducting its semi-annual safety aerial patrols in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties since October 13th.

The helicopter patrols are part of the company’s Vegetation Management Program to detect dead or dying trees that are at risk of starting a wildfire. 

Helicopters will depart from Paso Robles Municipal Airport and may last until November. PG&E is using helicopters to inspect the trees along transmission lines within High Fire-Threat Districts.

“Helicopter patrols allow our crews to identify hazard trees that could pose a safety risk, just one of the many ways PG&E is working to manage trees and other vegetation located near power lines,” said Chris Long, Vegetation Program Manager for the Los Padres region, which includes San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties. 

Patrols began will continue along several electric transmission lines located in the following areas: 

• Morro Bay, Templeton, Cayucos, Atascadero, San Miguel, San Luis Obispo, Oceano, Arroyo Grande, Nipomo, Sisquoc, and Santa Maria, including rural areas of eastern San Luis Obispo County. 

“This is his response to the drought that has lasted many years, that has posed a risk to electric lines and transmission lines across the state. And we're just really trying to make our hometown safe by patrolling the lines and making sure that we're mitigating any sort of wildfire. The risk of even power outages to our towns," said Carina Corral, Communications Representative for PG&E.

Once an area is identified as a hazard, PG&E will send out its ground force to mitigate the wildfire threat. This may include cutting down or trimming trees. Currently, 32 at-risk trees have been identified in the Los Padres National Forest and 4 in the Nipomo area.

“At this point, we need to go ground truth those trees and make sure that if they're actually capable of striking our facilities, that we do need to list those for work and mitigate them in the near future," said David Perry, Patrol Pilot for PG&E.

Currently, there are no immediate threats but areas have been identified to be mitigated in the near future.