Blackouts darken parts of Newport Beach

Paul Clinton and Deepa Bharath

NEWPORT BEACH -- An overtaxed state electric grid finally gave way

Monday evening, causing outages in the city.

Several intersections and offices bordering the eastern edge of John

Wayne Airport were blacked out for the hour between 4:45 and 5:45 p.m.

The blackouts hit traffic lights at Von Karman Avenue and Birch

Street, according to the Newport Beach Police Department, which received

about 10 minutes notice from state officials before the shutdown. A

number of nearby intersections were also hit.

The portion of the city affected Monday mostly included businesses,

many of which were still open during the hourlong period.

Schram Rod, who works at Pyramid Capital Investments Corp. on Birch

Street, said his business was unable to operate.

“It affected us big time,” Rod said. “Faxes didn’t come in. We were in

the middle of a networking project. We couldn’t work on that. No calls

came in. And we’re mortgage brokers, and when [phones are out], they

think you’re out of business.”

Rod said he suspects Monday’s blackout was just a sign of things to

come because the summer will be even hotter and will probably produce

many more power-grid shutdowns. He said he’s afraid of what could happen

at that point.

Jim and Elza Fujino, owners of Exclusive Pharmacy on Birch, said they

were unable to help three customers during the blackout because their

cash register, computers and fax machine were useless. The couple said

their only relief was that the outage occurred near the close of the day.

Everything also came to a standstill at Optimum Medical Clinics,

employee Chelin Merchan said. Because the power and phones were down, the

Birch Street clinic was unable to help its patients during the entire

hour, Merchan said.

The affected area was one of three circuits cut by Edison

International during the Stage 3 power alert. The outage affected 33,576

people, or about .3% of the utility’s 11 million customers, said Kim

Scherer, spokeswoman for Edison.

Edison’s coverage area stretches 50,000 square miles through Central

and Southern California. The utility covers most of Orange County,

including Costa Mesa. That city was not affected by the outage, though

with warmer temperatures expected today, blackouts are possible in the

area.