Storms hurt, benefit utilities in Southern Sierra

While storms wreaked havoc across Southern California this week, Central California felt the hit has well.

During the siege, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. scrambled to fix widespread outages that temporarily shut down 80,000 customers in Fresno, Madera and Merced counties Friday. Southern California Edison Co. also worked around the clock on outages, particularly in Shaver Lake, where several feet of snow fell during the weekend.

Both utilities reported most customers are back in service.

"It's snowing again in Shaver Lake," said Edison-area manager Glen Cardaronella on Tuesday. "But there are no high winds, like there were before."

While the blackouts are bad, when you hear "Snow" and "Shaver Lake" in the same sentence, there is a silver lining for Californians--Hydroelectric Fuel for next Summer!