A power outage shut down gaming at a popular San Diego casino on Mother’s Day.
Sycuan Casino boasts thousands of slot machines and video poker but many of them went dark Sunday around 1:30 p.m.
“I'm sitting in the dark at Bingo,” Angel Patterson posted to Facebook around 2 p.m. Sunday.
Gamers on the top level of the two-story casino were stuck at their machines for more than a half hour because they had money in the machine and couldn’t retrieve it until power was restored.
Gamblers swarmed employees on the floor to get their slot tickets redeemed one witness told NBC 7 San Diego.
The gambler said the casino could not cash any ticket over $100 so employees told customers to come back another day and get their tickets redeemed for cash.
Eventually, bank managers opened the casino vault and began cashing tickets the witness explained.
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“Had to leave because atms and cashier closed,” Judy Butson Gray posted Sunday. “Lucky we got to eat! SUCKED!!!!”
The casino was offering a special Mother’s Day promotion in its bingo hall and buffet.
Comments on the casino’s Facebook page suggest some of their customers who were there to celebrate were really frustrated about the outage.
“My wife is there stuck. Blackout,” Mike Marsch posted on Sycuan’s Facebook. “And not a winning blackout.”
Sycuan Casino is located 30 minutes east of San Diego in El Cajon.
San Diego Gas & Electric reported that power was shut off Sunday for approximately 1,132 customers in the Crest, Alpine, Dehesa, Granite Hills and Harbison Canyon area for safety reasons.
A sensor detected a fault in an SDG&E line so crews de-energized it and sent workers to trouble shoot.
An SDG&E spokesperson said the outage at the casino lasted from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. The outage was connected to an entire circuit linked to several customers, not just the casino the spokesperson said.
