Nearly a Third of San Francisco Loses Electricity

At least 125,000 customers out of 414,000 lost power on Saturday.

Nearly one-third of San Francisco went dark on Saturday in a power outage that began in the morning and knocked out electricity in more and more neighborhoods as the day wore on.

At least 125,000 out of 414,000 customers were without power as of Saturday afternoon, according to PowerOutage.com and Pacific Gas & Electric, the utility that serves the city. The outage cut power to a large swath of neighborhoods in the northern half of the city, including the Richmond and Sunset districts, through Haight Ashbury and all the way into downtown, according to a PG&E map of the city, with electricity outages indicated in red.

Firefighters were putting out a fire at a PG&E substation in the middle of the city and urging residents to avoid the area, the San Francisco Fire Department wrote on social media on Saturday afternoon.

PG&E said in a statement on X that it was working with emergency crews and city officials to resolve the outage, but it provided no further details and did not immediately respond to questions. It said that it had stabilized the grid and was not expecting additional outages at this time. (The utility said 130,000 customers were without power, though maps on its website and PowerOutage.com showed that several thousand fewer had been affected.)

Residents received notifications that it could be hours until their power was restored. The outage proved frustrating to San Franciscans who were gathering and shopping on the last weekend before the Christmas holiday. Stores and restaurants were also struggling to conduct transactions without their electronic payment systems in the tech-driven city.

Cellphone service was intact, but data speeds were slower than usual because residents no longer had Wi-Fi. Many of the businesses, restaurants, bars and grocery stores on Divisadero Street near Alamo Square were forced to shutter until their power was restored.

Traffic seemed to flow smoothly, despite drivers having to navigate without stop lights. Some individuals looking to escape the city were stuck at an ARCO gas station, waiting to pump gas after the power went out at 2:30 p.m. Pacific. The pumps rely on electricity.

“No power, no business,” said Kevin Lee, a gas station attendant.

At one neighborhood watering hole, Fool’s Errand, the power outage attracted a crowd looking for something to do. The business was taking cash payments, and its beer and wine was still flowing.

Some customers who sat down before the power went out were unable to pay, but a surprising number of them still carried cash, said Denise Yuki, 37, one of the proprietors of the bar.

“We got these lights from our neighbor,” she said, pointing to some battery-operated lamps that had been placed on tables.

She added that some neighbors had been so grateful the bar was still open that they began trying to acquire candles for the business.

How does one do that in this tech capital?

DoorDash, she said.

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