San Francisco power outage: Waymo vehicles block intersection

Waymo vehicles block intersection during power outage in San Francisco

Waymo temporarily halted its service in San Francisco on Saturday, December 20, after a widespread power outage hit the city and caused the self-driving taxis to stall. Video @brahmsstan via Storyful

Video on social media showed stalled Waymos dotting the streets of San Francisco Saturday during a major power outage. 

A fire at a substation left more than 130,000 homes and businesses without power. 

San Francisco power outage

The backstory:

A massive power outage in San Francisco Saturday caused major disruptions throughout the city. 

The outage, which occurred shortly after 1 p.m. on Saturday, left a large swath of the northern part of the city without power that began to grow in size. At its peak, the outage represented roughly one-third of the utility company’s customers in the city.

Dig deeper:

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.

What they're saying:

"The damage from the fire in our substation was significant and extensive, and the repairs and safe restoration will be complex," the utility said, referring to the substation at 8th and Mission streets. That fire has been blamed for some of the blackouts. The outage remains under investigation.

READ MORE: Power restored to much of San Francisco, City Hall still closed

Waymo outage

Waymo temporarily halted its service in San Francisco on Saturday, December 20, after a widespread power outage hit the city and caused the self-driving taxis to stall. Images @brahmsstan via Storyful

Video perspective:

Social media posts and local media reported mass closures of restaurants and shops and darkened street lights and Christmas decorations on Saturday, one of the busiest shopping days of the year. Traffic lights and public transportation were also affected.

Footage posted by TikTok user @brahmsstan and obtained by Storyful shows several Waymo vehicles stalled at an intersection in the Mission District neighborhood.

Dig deeper:

While the Waymo Driver is designed to treat non-functional signals as four-way stops, the sheer scale of the outage led to instances where vehicles remained stationary longer than usual to confirm the state of the affected intersections. This contributed to traffic friction during the height of the congestion.

What they're saying:

"We have temporarily suspended our ride-hailing services in the San Francisco Bay Area due to the widespread power outage. Our teams are working diligently and in close coordination with city officials, and we are hopeful to bring our services back online soon," the company told FOX Television Stations Sunday. 

Ride-hailing service resumed later on Sunday, with the company saying they are "focused on rapidly integrating the lessons learned from this event, and are committed to earning and maintaining the trust of the communities we serve every day." 

Big picture view:

Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company. Its self-driving taxis are available in some cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles and Phoenix.