A big fire that broke out on Friday at one of the biggest battery storage facilities in Northern California on Friday caused the evacuation of 1,700 people and the closure of a key highway. The incident in Moss Landing started Thursday. According to The Mercury News, fire crews were no battling the blaze, but rather were preparing to have it burn out on its own.
According to Monterey County spokesman Nicholas Pasculli, the incident was also burning early on Friday and had not spread beyond the service.
A few hundred people had already left a momentary removal center as of late on Thursday, according to Pasculli, and the rest had gone to friends, loved ones, or made other plans.
The Moss Landing Power Plant, located about 77 miles ( 125 kilometres ) south of San Francisco, is owned by Texas-based company Vistra Energy and contains tens of thousands of lithium batteries.
Batteries are crucial for storing energy from renewable energy sources like solar power, but if they catch fire, it can be very difficult to stop.
” There’s no way to sugar coating it. This is a catastrophe, is what it is”, Monterey County Supervisor Glenn Church told KSBW-TV. However, he claimed that he did not anticipate the fire to spread beyond the material structure it was encircled in.
The state Board of Supervisors scheduled an urgent meeting on Friday morning to hear a fire update.
According to The Mercury News, there were flames at the Vistra grow in 2021 and 2022 that were brought on by a malfunctioning fire sprinkler system that led to some products overheating.
What caused this most recent blaze, it was not clear. Everyone at the page was safely evacuated after it was discovered, according to Vistra in a statement. After the fireplace is outside, an investigation will commence.
” Our best priority is the safety of the community and our employees, and Vistra greatly appreciates the ongoing support of our local emergency rescuers”, Jenny Lyon, a spokeswoman for Vistra, said in a statement.
The North Monterey County Unified School District announced that all of its offices and schools would be shut down on Friday as a result of the fireplace.
