Outage affects 50,000 customers, disrupts traffic signals, BART service

EL CERRITO >> A power outage affecting about 50,000 customers in cities across the East Bay, including Berkeley, Albany, El Cerrito and Richmond, disrupted traffic signals and BART train service Sunday morning.

The three-and-a-halfhour outage began around 7:35 a.m. and was caused by an equipment failure at the utility’s El Cerrito substation, according to J.D. Guidi, a spokesman for PG&E. Details about why the equipment failed were not available, Guidi said.

PG&E crews restored power to all affected customers by 11:01 a.m., Guidi said.

Berkeley was hit the hardest by the outage, with about 33,000 customers who lost power there, and about 6,000 in Albany.

About 3,500 customers each were affected in El Cerrito and Richmond, Guidi said. There were also some who lost power in Oakland, San Pablo and Kensington.

Berkeley police sent out an alert for a major power outage at 8:39 a.m. Sunday morning, noting that traffic signals were not working across the city and reminding motorists to stop at all intersections before proceeding.

BART reported at 8:02 a.m. on Twitter that the downtown Berkeley BART station was closed due to the outage while PG&E worked to get power up again.

Around 9:30 a.m., a BART representative said electricians were on-site connecting the downtown Berkeley station to a generator, and by a little after 10 a.m., BART tweeted that the station had reopened, although escalators and elevators were not working and riders were warned to “expect residual delays.”

The elevators and escalators were operating later in the day, BART said.