VIDEOS: Southern California Edison on Wednesday dismantled one of two transmission towers suspected of starting the deadly Eaton Fire in January.
The removal of the towers is the next phase in the investigation to determine how the second-most destructive wildfire in California began in the San Gabriel Mountains. The towers will be moved to a site where investigators could examine the equipment more closely, according to SoCal Edison.
The dismantling of the towers began in April when crews removed conductors and connecting idle power lines. The remaining parts of Tower 208 were removed Wednesday afternoon with a SkyCrane helicopter and flown to a nearby landing zone to be examined by a team of stakeholders before further disassembly, the agency said.
The Mesa-Sylmar line, idled for decades, is being analyzed as part of the investigation into how the Eaton Fire started Jan. 7 before spreading into Altadena and burning homes and businesses. Edison raised the possibility in a February regulatory filing that the tower or circuit might have become momentarily energized through a phenomenon called induction.
โBoth towers will be taken apart piece by piece, with every piece tagged, then loaded on trucks and taken to a facility for further testing,โ said Marc Ferguson, SCE senior manager of Transmission Operations and Helicopter Assisted Line Organization (HALO). โThe process takes two to three days to complete.โ
