Posted on Mon, Dec. 16, 2002 By Liz Tascio CONTRA COSTA TIMES

The Bay Area barely had a chance to wring itself out Sunday before having to prepare for the third storm system in three days.

Sunday afternoon, forecasters were calling for heavy rain and strong winds with gusts up to 50 mph overnight.

By Sunday evening, Pacific Gas & Electric crews had restored power to 96 percent of the customers who had lost power in Saturday's storm -- but Sunday night's storm could undo a lot of the work, a spokeswoman said.

"The same lines that went down and were fixed could be down again," Christy Dennis said.

About 503,471 customers in the Bay Area were without power during the Friday and Saturday storms, Dennis said. In Contra Costa County, about 1,375 were still waiting for power at 5 p.m. Sunday.

PG&E customers who want updates on outages can call 800-743-5002, Dennis said, and customers who lose power should call 800-743-5000 to report it.

"We need customers telling us when they're out," Dennis said. "It's not like we can have a Big Brother device."

Dennis also asked customers for patience, and said 464 crews of about three people each have been working on repairs.

"We have 648 separate outages," she said. "We have to physically get to each one of those locations."

The California Highway Patrol reported no major accidents Sunday, but asked drivers to be extra careful.

"Motorists need to be aware that they need to slow down when it's raining and during this kind of windy or inclement weather," CHP Officer Shawna Wooden said.

With rain in the forecast all week, Livermore is on track to drown its average December rainfall of 2.47 inches, said Diana Henderson of the National Weather Service. The city has measured 2.08 inches already this month, and almost an inch of that fell Saturday.

"We're well on the way to a very wet December," Henderson said. "I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't another inch or so at the very least for the next week."

The weather service predicts showers and isolated thunderstorms for today, showers through Tuesday and a 30 percent chance of rain Thursday and Friday, Henderson said.

The Sierra Nevada can plan for one to two feet of snow Sunday night, but also heavy rains, Henderson said.

"They expect rain and snow falling on the western slopes until Sunday, which matches our (local) forecast of pretty much miserable until next Sunday," Henderson said.

-- Anonymous, December 16, 2002