Power outage in San Francisco, December 21, 2025. Photo: AA/ABACA / Abaca Press / Profimedia
About 130,000 residents of San Francisco were left without electricity on Saturday night due to a power outage, the city's main electricity company said, cited by France Presse and Reuters.
“We are working with emergency response teams and municipal authorities to fix a power outage in San Francisco that is affecting approximately 130,000 customers,” Pacific Gas & Electric Company said in a statement published on X.
The municipality asked residents to stay at home, as some traffic lights are not working and public transport is disrupted.
“It's going to rain, it's night. If you don't need to go out, stay indoors,” Mayor Daniel Lurie of the city's emergency operations center said in a video posted on social media.
He stated that traffic agents were mobilized to compensate for the lack of traffic lights.
The outage was caused by a fire at an electrical substation, added Lurie, who said he could not predict when power would be restored.
“Major power outage affects San Francisco – call 9-1-1 only for life-threatening emergencies, avoid non-essential travel, treat broken traffic lights as stop-sign intersections in all directions, keep refrigerator and freezer doors closed and turn off large appliances to prevent power surges,” the San Francisco Department of Emergency Management posted on social media.
A large power outage is impacting San Francisco – only call 9-1-1 for life safety emergencies, avoid non-essential travel, treat down traffic signals as four way stops, keep refrigerator and freezer doors closed, and turn off major appliances to prevent surges. Never use gas… pic.twitter.com/AZGU42J2C1
— San Francisco Department of Emergency Management (@SF_emergency) December 20, 2025
The power outage caused traffic jams and forced some businesses to close temporarily.
