SANTA ROSA (KRON) — With the looming possibility of more power shut-offs, one Santa Rosa rental company says its phones are ringing off the hook with people trying to rent generators.
“We are getting a lot of calls for generator needs,” said Bryan Scott with United Rentals in Santa Rosa.
The phone lines are busy.
People in the North Bay now calling rental companies looking for generators.
“When they start hearing the alerts, we start getting the calls,” he said.
Just weeks after a massive power shutoff across Northern California that left hundreds of thousands of people in the dark — PG&E says they could once again shut off power for some customers due to high fire danger later this week, including Danni Baird in Santa Rosa who needs power to operate a machine for her son’s medical treatments.
“We take that kind of stuff for granted when everything is working fine, not a problem,” Scott said. “When it stops working, that’s when it goes in front of mind.”
Scott with United Rentals gave Danni a generator during the last shut off — and is offering it up once again if it’s still needed.
The rental company also has several different sized generators still available, but likely not for long
United Rentals said it was chaos during the first power shut off with the phones ringing off the hook and generators they have in stock now are in high demand once again
“When the alerts start going out, our phone call volume increases like crazy,” said Rick Bellotti, with United Rentals.