San Francisco power outage affecting thousands of PG&E customers fully restored
An unexpected power outage in San Francisco affected almost 9,400 customers Saturday morning, according to PG&E.
The number of customers who lost power unexpectedly was 8,422, with 238 without power due to planned maintenance, the utility company's outage map states. Those without power were located in the Presidio, Richmond, Sea Cliff, Golden Gate Park and Panhandle neighborhoods.
San Francisco fire crews were called to Anza Street for reports of high-voltage wires arcing, a spokesperson said, but they were not sure if it was the cause of the power outage.
The power outage was reported just before 10 a.m., according to PG&E's outage map. In a statement, PG&E said, "This morning, around 9:45 am, during a routine operational procedure between two San Francisco substations, protective device on the system activated and there was an outage."
PG&E said crews were performing routine switching work between two substations so maintenance could be completed without de-energizing a much larger section of the electrical grid. The utility said the protective device unexpectedly activated during the process, causing the outage.
The outage lingered into the afternoon for some customers and businesses in the Richmond District, where restaurant owner Ben Pang said repeated outages have become a growing frustration.
"This really hurts the older small business. We're losing so many customers," Pang said. "Why only Geary Street? Why always this area?"
Pang said the neighborhood experienced a similar prolonged outage following a substation fire in San Francisco's Mission District last December and questioned why restoration estimates continued to be pushed back throughout the day.
Residents also expressed frustration over the outage and PG&E's communications. Jill Yong said she initially thought the utility's outage notification was sent by mistake because her power was still on when she received it.
"Like, this morning I got a notification saying my power was out, but the power was on," Yong said. "I was like, 'Is this a joke?' Then I see this and I guess it's not a joke. So, yeah, they're not super reliable, to say the least."
Others questioned whether San Francisco's electrical system is keeping pace with growing demand as the city continues to add housing and electricity usage increases.
As of 4:02 p.m., power had been restored to all affected customers, PG&E said. Crews restored service to all but about 2,500 customers by 12:10 p.m. before completing repairs later in the afternoon.
The utility company said about 120,000 customers received a power outage notification but there were never that many people without power.
"Due to the fact that two circuits were impacted, the outage notification system rolled up to a larger protective device, which indicated 120,000 customers were without power. That was not correct," PG&E said.
PG&E said the incorrect notification was caused when data transmitted between its SmartMeter systems and outage management system mistakenly indicated a much larger outage than had actually occurred. System operators identified the error and corrected it, and the utility said it will investigate the issue to ensure future outage communications are timely and accurate.
The utility also said it will continue investigating the cause of the outage.
