LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – With a storm set to arrive, Pacific Gas and Electric is offering a number of suggestions to help power customers prepare.

Preparing for power outages

• Have battery-operated flashlights and radios with fresh batteries ready. Listen for updates on storm conditions and power outages.
• If you have a telephone system that requires electricity to work (such as a cordless phone or answering machine), plan for alternate communication – have a standard telephone handset, cellular telephone or pager ready as a back up.
• Freeze plastic containers filled with water to make blocks of ice that can be placed in your refrigerator/freezer during an outage to prevent foods from spoiling.

Safety tips

• Treat all downed power lines as if they are "live" or energized. Keep yourself and others away from them. Call 911, then notify PG&E at 1-800-743-5002.
• Use battery-operated flashlights, not candles.
• Customers with generator should make sure they are properly installed by a licensed electrician. Improperly installed generators pose a significant danger to our crews.
• Unplug or turn off all electric appliances to avoid overloading circuits and fire hazards when power is restored. Simply leave a single lamp on to alert you when power returns. Turn your appliances back on one at a time when conditions return to normal.

Reporting a power outage

• Before calling PG&E about a power outage, check to see if other neighbors are affected. This would confirm if an outage has occurred in just your residence or within the neighborhood area.
• If only your residence is without power, check circuit breakers and/or fuse boxes to see if the problem is limited to the home electric system.
• After performing the steps above, single or neighborhood outages can be reported to: PG&E's 24-Hour Emergency and Customer Service Line: 1-800-743-5002.
• Once your outage has been reported, you can call PG&E's Outage Information Line at 1-800-743-5002 to get a status report on your outage and the anticipated time your power will be turned back on.
• If you lose power overnight, you can call PG&E to request a wake-up call. They'lll be happy to give you a wake up call, as well as up-to-date information on your outage and time of restoration.