High winds continued to wreak havoc across SoCal as the region awoke Sunday morning to reports of damage from Oxnard to Ontario, where an intense mulch fire was beaten back.
The blaze only died down when Santa Ana winds flagged overnight, Ontario fire officials said. Across the area, power utilities were still working to restore electricity knocked out by downed power lines.
Southern California Edison reported that 11,000 customers in Los Angeles county were without power as of 7:30 a.m. In the city of Los Angeles, where as many as 52,000 people had lost power, about 1,500 still hadn't had their power restored, according to the LA Department of Water and Power, which supplies power to city residents.
Wind-related damage was widespread Saturday. Emergency workers responded to fallen trees, sagging or downed power lines and a billboard that was knocked over. One crashed tree shut down Oxnard Boulevard and caused $25,000 of damage to an auto sales store, Oxnard fire officials said.
Firefighters battling the Ontario mulch fire said they were contending with winds gusting at 20 to 30 mph. "The structure behind us, a single-fmaily residence, was threatened for a while," Ontario Fire Department deputy chief Mike Pelletier said.
Wind advisories remain in effect until Sunday afternoon for the San Fernando and San Gabriel vallies, along with the hills from Malibu to Hollywood, according to the National Weather Service. Wind gusts of up to 30 mph were expected in the Inland Empire.
But the winds are expected to die down by about 4 p.m., according to NBC4's Futurecast.
"We're now in the back end of the wind event," meteorologist David Biggar said.
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It won't be the end of weather events in Southern California -- the wind could make way for scattered showers Monday morning, when clouds move into the area.
