PG&E Zogg Fire Hearings: Day 5 | Blog Updates

REDDING, Calif. — ABC10 is in court, where day 5 of PG&E’s Zogg Fire manslaughter hearing began. To catch up on day 4 of coverage, click HERE. 

This blog will be updated as today's court hearing continues.

4:21 p.m. PST

That's a wrap on Day 5 of the PG&E manslaughter hearing

See you on ABC10 at 6:30pm.

We'll be back in court on Tuesday at 9am.

I'm off next week. My excellent colleague Tyler Horst will update the case over on the birdsite at: https://twitter.com/tylermhorst

4:15 p.m. PST

Just judge and lawyers now in the PG&E manslaughter hearing

DA has run through today's witnesses. Now some housekeeping about evidence & witnesses.

DA atty Ben Hanna says he feels we're doing well on time: anticipates wrapping presenting the prosecution's case on Thurs, Feb 2 but he can't promise it at this point. 

Some haggling over expert air contamination witnesses. PG&E wants its expert to be able to listen to the DA expert.

4:03 p.m. PST

Another PG&E employee, John Daubenspeck, is up next in the PG&E manslaughter hearing.

His work deals with software for vegetation management.

In Feb 2019, he says, he was aware of holdover trees on Zogg Mine Rd. There was a meeting. He was unaware of any issues of "refusals"-- people who wouldn't allow work to be done.

He was super quick. And he's done.

3:55 p.m. PST

PGE manslaughter hearing prosecutors ask PG&E employee Charles Filmer if he remembers seeing estimates of a $5 - 50M cost for PG&E to have inspectors walk 360-degrees around potential strike trees.

He doesn't remember the specific figures, he says.

It's a bit awkward. DA atty Ian Frazer is holding a document with that kind of estimate on it, obtained as evidence from PG&E-- but we don't know who wrote it. 

Filmer is done.

3:36 p.m. PST

Here's the EIR for the 2020 Zogg Fire as filed with CPUC. This is how we learned PG&E was under investigation for starting it:

"CAL FIRE informed PG&E that they had taken possession of PG&E
equipment as part of CAL FIRE’s ongoing investigation into the cause of the Zogg Fire," it says.

It was filed Oct 9. The fire started Sept 27.

3:32 p.m. PST

Charles Filmer, a former PG&E employee from 1985 - 2021, is the next witness in the PG&E manslaughter hearing.

Toward the middle of that time, he was in regulatory compliance for PG&E.

He's been asked about EIR's, the brief reports that PG&E needs to file when fires start under certain circumstances. There is one for the Zogg Fire.

Filmer is sent briefly out of the room so the DA & PG&E lawyers can debate a piece of evidence...

3:06 p.m. PST

Forgive the muddy image, I had to shoot this off of a TV screen being used to show evidence in PG&E manslaughter hearing.

Here's what Loomis wrote in April 2019 in his notice to PG&E about tree inspections.

The following year, the Zogg Fire would start when a wounded gray pine hit PG&E's power line. Prosecutors say 2019 / 2020 inspections failed to find a gaping wound on the tree because it was on the back side of the trunk.

3:02 p.m. PST

Ken Loomis, a PG&E manager, provides testimony in the PG&E manslaughter hearing about his decision to flag concerns about how contracted tree inspectors did their jobs for the utility.

In April 2019, he put it in writing: warning the company that the way inspections were done could miss safety problems because crews weren't waling 360-degrees around trees.

He's off the stand but may be called back later today.

2:49 p.m. PST

DA done on direct. PG&E atty Brad Brian now has PG&E employee Ken Loomis on cross exam in the PG&E manslaughter hearing.

Preventing wildfires was the top priority, Loomis agrees.

Brian is asking Loomis about "speak up culture," as it's known in PG&E.

"I felt emboldened to share my ideas and feedback," after hearing PG&E SVP Michael Lewis give his Challenger-disaster-O-ring talk via video, Loomis says.

2:26 p.m. PST

Loomis wrote another CAP expressing worry PG&E's contracted inspectors didn't walk 360-degrees around trees unless they saw a problem from the power lines.

"Tree defects not in plain view from the right of way will go unnoticed and tree not worked," Loomis wrote. He called it a legal liability.

Sure enough, PG&E has been charged with 31 crimes with prosecutors pointing to this as a critical issue behind the Zogg Fire.

2:19 p.m. PST

On the stand in the PG&E manslaughter hearing, Loomis worried "we were not doing a sufficient inspection" to actually find all the trees that pose a risk to the lines.

He's going over a CAP filing (PG&E's internal feedback system for problems) in which he wrote about "PG&E practices being inconsistent with the letter of the law" for tree trimming.

He adds that he thought the law needed to be "fixed" in his opinion as an arborist.

On the stand in PG&E manslaughter hearing, Loomis worried "we were not doing a sufficient inspection" to actually find all the trees that pose a risk to the lines.

He's going over a CAP filing (PG&E's internal feedback system for problems) in which he wrote about "PG&E practices being inconsistent with the letter of the law" for tree trimming.

He adds that he thought the law needed to be "fixed" in his opinion as an arborist.

2:03 p.m. PST

In the PG&E manslaughter hearing, Ken Loomis says he discussed his concerns with PG&E exec Michael Lewis, a senior VP.

We're seeing a Jan 2019 email Loomis sent as feedback on potential safety problems.

Lewis had given a talk via video, using the O-ring behind the Challenger shuttle disaster as an example.

It's a long email and I can't make it all out on the courtroom screen.

1:51 p.m. PST

What is a "hazard tree?"

"I think that's a matter of debate," says Loomis. He defines it as a tree with an "increased likelihood" of falling onto a particular target (like power lines.)

We're about to get into the concern that Loomis had about 360-degree inspections of trees.

He raised the issue in PG&E's "Corrective Action Program" or CAP, which is available to anyone on PG&E's computers.

1:47 p.m. PST

Loomis & his team interacted with PG&E's federal monitor, part of the company's probation for 6 federal felonies from the deadly San Bruno gas explosion.

Federal law caps probation at 5 years.

"In these five years, PG&E has gone on a crime spree and will emerge from probation as a continuing menace to California," US Dist Judge William Alsup said when PG&E got off probation last January. 

1:41 p.m. PST

We begin post-lunch PG&E manslaughter hearing with another PG&E employee: Ken Loomis, who is a manager for "operational excellence" of tree work. He's an arborist.

His name came up this morning around the issue of internal confusion at PG&E about whether tree contractors are supposed to walk *all the way around* trees during inspections.

Not doing that, investigators say, allowed multiple rounds of inspections to miss the Zogg Fire tree.

1:29 p.m. PST