Elon Musk boasts of Tesla services as Waymo’s driverless cars froze due to San Francisco power outage — What happened?

Nearly 17,000 customers remained without power in San Francisco even as San Francisco officials restored power to most of the 1,30,000 affected homes late on December 21, AP reported.

In particular, numerous citizens and drivers in San Francisco reported that Waymo’s driverless vehicles froze in the middle of the streets, causing chaos and traffic, while the power outage affected traffic signals in the city. Billionaire Elon Musk took the chance to boast that Tesla’s own self-driving cars did not encounter similar disruptions despite the power outage.

Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) said its crews were working Sunday to restore power to several neighborhoods and small areas of downtown San Francisco following the outage that began Saturday, Dec. 20.

What caused the fire and when will services be restored?

The outage is believed to have occurred after a fire at PG&E’s substation at 8th and Mission streets, causing significant damage to infrastructure. The report stated that further investigation into the cause of the incident is ongoing.

The utility said it could not give a timeline for when power would be fully restored.

“The damage from the fire at our substation was significant and extensive, and repairs and safe restoration will be complex,” he said, adding that additional engineers and electricians were dispatched to assist with restoration efforts.

“This is a very complex work plan and will require the highest level of safety focus to ensure safe work actions,” PG&E said.

San Francisco power outage: What happened?

• The AP report noted that no injuries have been reported so far due to the outage in San Francisco.
• According to the AP, the outage began a little after 1pm on December 20 (Saturday) and left much of the northern part of the city without power. At its worst, nearly a third of utility customers in the California city were without power.

• PG&E said in a post on X (formerly Twitter) around 4pm on December 20 that the grid had stabilized and did not expect any further outages.
• The San Francisco Department of Emergency Management said in its own post on X that “significant public transportation disruptions” were occurring across the city. Residents were asked to avoid non-essential travel and treat traffic signals as four-way stops.
• Making traffic problems worse, Alphabet-backed Waymo’s self-driving vehicles have reportedly stalled on streets due to traffic light outages. The company had to suspend services. “Our teams are working diligently and in close coordination with city officials, and we hope to bring our services back online soon,” a Waymo spokesperson said in a statement on December 21.

Bad day to ride Waymo? Videos show traffic mayhem and chaos

Some of Waymo’s self-driving services froze mid-ride across the city after traffic lights went dark at major intersections. Social media was filled with images of many cars stopped in the middle of the street, their flashing lights flashing.

Driver Michele Riva, 30, told Bloomberg she was driving home in her Waymo car when the outage occurred. He added that his car stopped without notice in front of a “very busy intersection” and non-functioning traffic lights when he was just a minute away from his destination.

“I stayed with Waymo for a few minutes just to see. The problem was that initially there were no traffic lights so a lot of people were crossing the street. So I believe Waymo didn’t know what to do,” he added.

Elon Musk seizes the opportunity to brag about Tesla FSD

Meanwhile, Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and CEO of Tesla Inc., used the social media platform he owns, X, to boast that Waymo’s rival robotaxi was “unaffected” by the power outage.

The official Tesla AI account on He noted: “FSD is trained on billions of real-world miles, including power outages.”

According to the Tesla website, “Tesla uses billions of miles of anonymous real-world driving data to deliver Fully Self-Driving (Supervised) training,” allowing driving “almost anywhere with your active supervision, requiring minimal intervention.”

(With input from AP and Bloomberg)