Souther California Edison admitted that some of its sparking equipment likely started the Hurst Wildfire in Los Angeles last month.
In a filing released Thursday, SoCal Edison said fire agencies were looking into whether its equipment could have been responsible for the Hurst Fire that tore through 800 acres of the Sylmar area. The investigation found there to be a high likelihood.
“Absent additional evidence, SCE believes its equipment may be associated with the ignition of the Hurst Fire,” Thursday’s filing said.
A second filing from fire agencies looked into whether idle transmission lines under SoCal Edison’s purview that became suddenly energized could have also been responsible for the devasting Eaton Fire that burned through Altadena. This filing did not find the necessary evidence to tie SCE to that larger fire.
Suspicion to the origin of the Hurst Fire arouse after video footage released showed an explosion occur before flames that sent firefighters to Sombrero Canyon and Saddletree Ranch. ABC7 interviewed Pedro Pizarro, president and CEO of Edison International – the parent company of SoCal Edison – about the explosion and sparking equipment.
“The fire was reported to start at 10:10 p.m., but the first sign that we saw of any electrical anomaly that would indicate sparking was at 10:11 p.m.,” Pizarro said. “So that does raise uncertainty for us. We said in our report, we know there’s damage to our equipment, we don’t know if that damage happened before or after the ignition of the fire.”
In total, the January wildfires that blazed around Los Angels claimed 29 lives and 16,000 homes and buildings were destroyed. AccuWeather has estimated that the financial toll of this disaster caused more than $250 billion in total damage and economic loss.
Both the Palisades and Eaton fires only reached full containment a week ago.
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