Unknown petroleum product causing blackouts in Burlingame as businesses continue to struggle

BURLINGAME, Calif. (KGO) -- Stores were open for business once again Thursday after a difficult week along Burlingame's Broadway corridor.

After having multiple power outages over the past five days, on Wednesday PG&E crews discovered a petroleum product was leaking into their underground electrical vaults damaging equipment.

But the process to get the lights back on hasn't been easy.

Even though PG&E provided generators for those impacted, businesses were told they had to hire a private electrician to do checks before the utility company would hook them up.

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"To be able to certify that it's okay to turn on the power and use the generators so we don't have explosions," said John Kevranian of the Broadway Burlingame Business Improvement District.

That process further delayed getting power back for merchants like Lucy Dul of Burlingame LaGuna Florist.

Dul says she has a big event Friday that she needs to prepare for- even if it's in the dark.

"It's a mom and pop shop. We're not a big corporation where we can find a way to support our staff and our overhead payment," said Dul.

In order to help the businesses, representatives of the Burlingame Business Improvement District say they're going to ask their board to subsidize the costs.

Something that would help restaurant owner Calvin Wang, who says he's lost thousands of dollars over the past few days.

"At least $12,000. With the employees' salaries and the waste of the food and the revenue," said Wang.

PG&E is still working to extract all of the petroleum product from the vaults and identify where it's coming from.

They say it's not something they use with their equipment.

In the meantime, the Broadway businesses say they're just looking forward to things going back to normal.

"I just hope it won't happen again," said Wang.