Southern California winds threaten to topple trees, power lines

Winds whipped through swaths of Southern California on Saturday, prompting forecasters to warn of downed trees and power lines.

In the Los Angeles area, the strongest winds were blowing in the Santa Clarita and northern San Fernando valleys, where gusts were reaching 50 mph Saturday morning, while West Los Angeles was recording gusts of 30 to 35 mph, said Mike Wofford, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard. The winds were expected to pick up slightly throughout the day, with isolated gusts of 65 mph possible in some mountain areas, but largely confined to western L.A. County, he said.

Already by Saturday morning a tree had fallen onto two vehicles in the 1100 block of Beverly Drive, briefly blocking the street before crews cleared it, said Brian Humphrey of the Los Angeles Fire Department. No injuries were reported.

Scattered power outages were reported throughout L.A. County, particularly on the Westside. As of noon Saturday, about 2,840 of Southern California Edison’s 5 million customers remained without power, with 1,577 in L.A. County and the bulk of the remainder in Riverside, Tulare and Ventura counties.

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