Powerful winds damaged several homes and at the peak, left about 17,000 people in Marin and Sonoma Counties in the dark on Christmas Eve.
Powerful winds damaged several homes and at the peak, left about 17,000 people in Marin and Sonoma Counties in the dark on Christmas Eve.
In Marin County, about 12,000 PG&E customers in San Anselmo, Fairfax, and West Marin were without power for several hours Wednesday.
In Sonoma County, the outages have been a lot more outages because of fallen trees damaging power lines.
It was a rude awakening on Christmas Eve for some neighbors in Rio Nido, a community near Guerneville.
"It sounded like "bam!" Good morning! At one o'clock in the morning," said Angela Gillespie Jones.
All over Sonoma County, wild winds snapped tree limbs and trees came crashing down on power lines.
"Yeah, it was really scary," said Gillespie Jones.
Now, those residents are in the dark for the holiday.
"Thankfully, my mom's church will open up for us. We will cook dinner there. We will load up there. Hopefully we can find some where to stay. Because it'll take PG&E won't be here for a day or two," said Sierra Simmons.
Dan Blanchard showed us what happened to his home.
"Sixty-mile per hour gusts were coming through -- probably more than that. Branches were just falling everywhere. I got two big holes in the roof and the mast to my power lines down," said Blanchard.
Overnight in Guerneville along Highway 116, a fallen redwood tree destroyed three cars and smashed into two homes.
Sonoma County Fire says a three-year old child who was in one of those homes was taken to the hospital with minor injuries.
"Those high winds we experienced last night and also the winds we are expecting tonight is always a big worry. It's also the limbs that come down too, It's really dangerous," said Captain Sam Crenshaw with Sonoma County Fire. "Be aware where those limbs could come down and be cognizant of any potential dangers."
Early this morning in Bodega Bay, a power pole snapped and fell across Highway 1 near the Bodega Dunes Campground.
That blocked traffic and caused several outages.
And in Santa Rosa, crews worked to clear away much the of debris after trees came down on several vehicles and roads.
For so many people looking forward to spending time with family and friends for the Christmas holiday, extreme winds and extended power outages now mean big headaches.
"Everyone is going to be off for a while. Its going to be a dark Christmas," said Blanchard.
As of 4 p.m. Thursday, PGE says they have about 13,000 customers in the North Bay without power.
More heavy winds are expected in the next round of storms.
PG&E says they're working as quickly as possible to return power to customers.
