Southern California Edison faces lawsuits over LA wildfires

In one suit, multiple witnesses are cited as having seen a fire at the base of a transmission tower owned by the utility.

Southern California Edison, a unit of utility Edison International, has been hit with multiple lawsuits claiming its electrical equipment started one of the major wildfires raging in the Los Angeles area, according to court filings.

The suits, filed on Monday, appear to be the first of hundreds or even thousands that will arise from the wildfires that have engulfed parts of Southern California in the United States in the past week.

The lawsuits were filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of homeowners, renters, business owners and others with properties destroyed by the Eaton fire in the Pasadena area.

At least 24 people have died since the fires began last Tuesday, and more than 90,000 residents have been forced to flee their homes. More than two dozen people are reported missing, authorities have said.

The Eaton Fire in the foothills east of Los Angeles has scorched roughly 5,712 hectares (14,117 acres), or 57 sq km (22 sq miles) – nearly the size of Manhattan. That fire is the second most destructive inferno in California history, according to one complaint.

In one of the suits, multiple witnesses are cited as having observed a fire at the base of a transmission tower owned by Southern California Edison.

Some of those witnesses shared videos of the incident on their social media accounts, including a post by Instagram user @jeffrey.ku of a video of a fire at the base of a transmission tower that he said was taken shortly after the start of the Eaton fire.

It also referred to Brendan Thorn, who was interviewed by local ABC News. Thorn said in the interview that he lives near Eaton Canyon and saw “knee-high” fires around transmission towers shortly after the fire began.

Southern California Edison did not immediately respond to a Reuters news agency request for comment on the lawsuits.

On Monday morning, the Edison International CEO said in a TV interview that the company was continuing to investigate the fires and had not identified any electrical anomalies from its equipment around the time the Eaton fire broke out.

“It’s pretty typical you see those when you have a spark coming from equipment,” Pedro Pizarro said during the CNBC interview when asked about the company’s investigation into the Eaton fire.

“There could be some other mechanism here. Unfortunately, we have not been able to get close to the lines yet,” he said.

Stock down

Edison International’s shares were down nearly 12 percent to $57.24 on Monday. They have declined by about 27 percent since the fires broke out last week.

SCE, on January 9 and 10, filed safety incident reports on the Eaton and Hurst fires, respectively.

Southern California Edison said it has received notices from insurance companies to preserve evidence related to the Eaton fire, adding the fire could allegedly be attributable to its utility facilities, which prompted it to release its January 9 report.

It also added that no fire agency had suggested its electric facilities were involved in the ignition of the fires.

However, a day later in the Hurst report, the company noted they had found a downed conductor in the area but did not know if the damage occurred before or after the start of the fire.