Thousands of Sierra Nevada residents remain without power after December storm

LAKE TAHOE, Calif. (KFSN) -- Thousands of residents in the Sierra Nevada west of Lake Tahoe are still without running water, heat or power.

That's after a powerful storm last month dumped heavy snow that downed trees and damaged electrical equipment.

The outages began on December 26 after a storm that was part of a record month of snow for the region.

PG&E says the vast majority of households have their power back, but crews are still working to restore electricity to nearly seven-thousand customers.

"Hopefully they'll get it done fast. Seems like they're doing a pretty good job getting moving things along. I mean it's pretty amazing really," says resident Jim Christofferson.

Officials say the prolonged outage has been especially hard for people with disabilities or health issues who use electric medical devices.

Even those with generators say it's been a long wait for their power to be restored.

Crews have also been in the area working to clear downed trees.