The city of Chico and surrounding communities could potentially lose power early Wednesday morning. Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) released a statement today announcing plans to cut power to most of northern California.

The shutoff, which is set to take place just after midnight, is designed to prevent fires being sparked due to high winds.

There is a map available on the company’s official website that shows the exact locations of where the shutoff will occur, however at the time of writing the website is currently unavailable due to the large amount of traffic it has been receiving.

According to a release from the Chico Police Department, at this time Chico State is not included in the projected shutoff zone. As it is designated as a “critical customer,” power to the main campus and residence halls would only be cut as a last resort.

Upon calling Chico’s local branch of PG&E, an automated message states that they are currently unable to assist customers and will return power as soon as it is safe to do so. A call to both PG&E and Cal Fire proved fruitless as both phone lines were overwhelmed with callers.

According to various posts by the company on Twitter, students can expect a possibility of up to five days of no power depending on how the weather conditions are.

The Orion is closely following this and will be periodically updating this story. Currently, students can go to PG&E’s twitter handle @PGE4Me for official updates.

Jack Lewis can be reached at [email protected].