An ongoing power outage in downtown Long Beach has forced government services and small businesses to close as electricians try to restore power.
An equipment failure in the underground electrical vaults started a fire, which caused the power outage at 3:08 p.m. Wednesday, and has cut off service to several city blocks, according to Southern California Edison.
“We do not have a time for estimated for restoration of services yet,” said Paul Griffo, a spokesperson for SCE. “Crews are still working and testing.”
As of 3 p.m. Friday, over 3,300 Edison customers remained without power, according to Griffo.
The area affected includes residences and local businesses, which are continuing to face intermittent cuts to power.
Long Beach’s downtown restaurant and bar district was forced to close early or limit their menu to patrons. The power outage prevented these establishments from cooking or refrigerating their food or providing lighting and air conditioning for customers.
“We had a limited menu, we could only serve cold sandwiches and take cash,” said Marc Maravilla, a host for Hamburger Mary’s said after the power was cut on the first day.
Other businesses took advantage of the power outage in order to complete chores that normally would be difficult to accomplish while catering to customers.
“We ended up closing a couple hours later [after the outage],” said Jesus Saenz, manager of Alondra Hot Wings. “We were able to do some deep cleaning, so we were able to make the most of our time.
An outage at 11:00 a.m. on Thursday kept much of the downtown area in the dark. Other stores relied on back-up generators in order to keep their doors open.
The outage forced the Long Beach Police Department and the Superior Court offices to close pubic services.
Traffic lights also went dark, causing congestion. A few intersections were supplied with personal generators that allowed traffic to flow normally.
According to SCE, the outage came after an equipment failure caused a fire near Cedar and Third Street.
“We responded with the fire department last night when the officers were alerted to the smell of smoke,” Sergeant Megan Zabel said.
Firefighters put out the blaze, however the exact cause of the failure is still being investigated.
The City of Long Beach tweeted that no traffic accidents were reported as a result of the outage.
Power was restored to businesses along the Pike Shoreline district at 4 p.m. Thursday, but power has still not been fully restored to other parts of the city.
“We’ve been testing our underground systems and trying to identify where all the problems are,” said Ronald Garcia, another spokesperson for SCE. “As we do these tests we identify where there are problems and isolate them.”
According to the most recent update on the outage, SCE crews are continuing to work on returning power to the downtown area. SCE is also handing out free water and flashlights to local residents on 730 Pacific Avenue.