A fire at BART‘s San Leandro station early Tuesday triggered the system’s second major service disruption this month, halting trains in much of the East Bay and South Bay.
BART didn’t immediately provide details about the blaze, but video posted on social media showed what appeared to be an electrical fire along the tracks at the station shortly before 5 a.m. There was also a power outage in neighborhoods around the San Leandro station.
Spokesperson Chris Filippi told reporters at the San Leandro station that the fire had damaged train control equipment and a high-voltage electrical cable that feeds power to the system’s third rail.
The fire shut down all BART service south of Oakland’s Lake Merritt station, stranding passengers on the Green Line between San Jose’s Berryessa station and Daly City, on the Blue Line between Dublin/Pleasanton and Daly City, and on the Orange Line between Richmond and Berryessa.
The agency said on social media just before 10 a.m. that it could still take six to eight hours to restore normal service. It advised customers to seek alternate transportation.
AC Transit is offering replacement service between the Lake Merritt and Fremont stations. VTA is running substitute service between the Milpitas and Berryessa stations.
Tuesday’s incident marked the second time in recent weeks that BART has suffered a service meltdown. On May 9, a still-unexplained computer network failure shut down the system for several hours.
This story was originally published by KQED, a listener-supported public radio station serving Northern California. We occasionally republishe KQED stories we believe will be of interest to our readers.
