The SFFD told KTVU that the outage was affecting at least 130,000 customers.
SAN FRANCISCO - More than 100,000 customers in San Francisco were left without power due to a massive PG&E outage on Saturday.
PG&E first reported an outage in the Inner Sunset affecting just under 15,000 customers around 9:40 a.m., which was followed by outages at around 10:10 a.m. affecting the Richmond, Presidio, and Golden Gate Park areas, and parts of downtown San Francisco that affected thousands more.
BART said trains would not run through the Powell Street, Civic Center and Van Ness stations due to the power outage. Video shared with KTVU showed the BART stations in the area darkened, with tollgates and escalators not functioning.
BART later announced about 7:10 p.m. that the Powell Street station was reopened. The Cvic Center station was reopened about 25 minutes later.
The San Francisco Department of Emergency Management said traffic lights in the area would likely be affected. Images from bystanders in the city showed intersections snarled with traffic and automated vehicles struggling to navigate the streets without the presence of traffic signals.
Waymo released a statement announcing that it would suspend its services during the power outage.
"We are focused on keeping our riders safe and ensuring emergency personnel have the clear access they need to do their work," Waymo said.
PG&E's outage map showed that – as of about 4:15 p.m. – nearly 125,000 users in San Francisco were without power, comprising more than 30% of the utility company's customer base in the city.
At about 6:15 p.m., San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie released a video statement advising people in the city to stay inside if possible in order to stay safe during the power outages.
"We still have many traffic lights out, we have a lot officers," Lurie said. "[We have] law enforcement officers, traffic enforcement officers out at intersections. But we got rain coming and its nighttime."
PG&E substation fire
San Francisco Fire Department Lt. Mariano Elias told KTVU that at least some of the outages were possibly related to a fire at a PG&E substation in the area of Eighth and Mission streets that was reported shortly after 2 p.m.
Elias said PG&E workers inside of the substation noticed the fire and they called the SFFD. PG&E workers evacuated the substation and shut off power to the building, allowing SFFD firefighters to douse the flames.
Elias said crews managed to get the fire under control with no injuries or displacement, but were working to ventilate the building after smoke accumulated inside.
When will power be restored?
PG&E Public Relations Coordinator Edgar Hopida said in a statement that the company could not confirm notifications on the PG&E website that power would be restored by late Saturday. He did note that crews have "stabilized the grid," and no further outages were expected.
However, at about 8:30 p.m., PG&E spokesperson Tamar Sarkissian said crews were expected to have power restored "later this evening." No specific timeframe was given.
As of about 9 p.m., the PG&E outage map showed just over 95,000 customers were still without power – a roughly 30,000-customer improvement from the figures reported about five hours earlier.