At around 6 am, on November 8th, 2018 the deadliest wildfire in U.S history would spark the historic PG&E lawsuit. Now, against all odds, California lawyers are determined to not letting them get away with causing the butte county camp fire.
First responders arrived to contain the fire within 30 minutes of it starting only to come to a horrific conclusion: the fire was raging so rampantly that they needed to evacuate the nearby city of Paradise. And so the race begun.
In what can only be described as intense chaos, first responders attempted to clear out the elderly town of Paradise, district by district. Meanwhile, Camp Fire was spreading at a rate of 1 football field per second. The evacuation was not entirely successful.
Although many people made it out alive, flaws in the evacuation plan meant that entire neighborhoods failed to be alerted of the impending doom.
17 days later, and the Butte County Camp fire had claimed the lives of 80 mostly elderly people, had destroyed over 18,000 buildings, had scorched over 160,000 acres of land and caused nearly $16.5 billion dollars in damages.
The PG&E Lawsuit: Why They Won't Get Away This Time
Pacific Gas and Electric is California's largest utility company and this isn't the first time they've been accused of starting a wildfire. But, hopefully, this will be the last time they get away with it because according the wildfire lawyers at Wagner and Jones, "the evidence against PG&E is overwhelming and declaring bankruptcy won't save them".
To understand what's going on it's important to start by following the money. PG&E's managers earn bonuses based on how few customer complaints they receive instead of how well of a job they do. In the event of a wildfire, most sensible power companies would shut down power in an effort to avoid spreading the fire. However, this is a policy that PG&E's managers failed to execute because they wanted to avoid customer complaints about the power being out.
Next, records show that an electrical safety inspection report was filed showing that the transmission lines were behaving erratically on the morning of November 8th. And later on, aerial assets detected that a transmission tower was visibly damaged.
Lastly, several customer e-mails were sent complaining about sparking transmission lines outside their home. And to hammer in the last nail, multiple witnesses stated that they saw the fires starting from PG&E power lines.
The evidence against Pacific Gas and Electric truly is overwhelming.
In the face of what's amounting to be a historic lawsuit, PG&E attempted to declare bankruptcy to bide their time. Contrary to what many people believe, this lawsuit won't save them from the lawsuits, it will only buy them a little time in order to prepare for the oncoming wave of litigation.
Unfortunately though, that hasn’t stopped many of the butte county wildfire victims from feeling discouraged. If you or someone you know has been a victim to these wildfires, then remind them that even if they do not have insurance, many lawyers are offering free consultation.
It’s hard to say that there’s a silver lining in this story. The grim reality is that an entire city was burned, many people died, and the neighboring areas have had to suffer the full economic impact of the wildfire. This fire has not been the first that PG&E has been implicated in. Their shady behaviors have caused historic levels of damage in the last 5 years alone.
The lawsuit about PG&E is about the butte camp fire. But, it’s also about something bigger. It’s about setting the precedent that corporations cannot forsake their customers in favor of profit. It’s about getting paying for the damages that thousands of innocents have suffered.
Contact Wagner and Jones today to get a free wildfire consultation from expert attorneys.
