Abandoned rice cookers keep bomb squads busy in SF and Vacaville

A rice cooker left at a bus stop on South Van Ness Avenue at Mission Street prompted bomb-squad response and the shut down of the major intersection Thursday morning for about two hours. Police determined that the cooking device was not a threat. less A rice cooker left at a bus stop on South Van Ness Avenue at Mission Street prompted bomb-squad response and the shut down of the major intersection Thursday morning for about two hours. Police determined that ... more Photo: Sarah Ravani / The Chronicle / / Photo: Sarah Ravani / The Chronicle / / Image 1 of / 7 Caption Close Abandoned rice cookers keep bomb squads busy in SF and Vacaville 1 / 7 Back to Gallery

A rice cooker left at a bus stop on South Van Ness Avenue and Mission street prompted a police bomb squad response Thursday morning and the shut down of the major intersection and surrounding streets for about two hours before the kitchen device was determined not to be a threat.

Just 30 minutes after the rice cooker was declared safe in San Francisco, the Vacaville Police Department received a call about an abandoned rice cooker discovered under the I-80 overpass on Mason Street between Peabody Road and Depot Street.

A Muni bus driver called the San Francisco police around 7:30 a.m. after spotting the first abandoned rice cooker at the bus shelter in front of a Goodwill store at the intersection.

Police blocked off the intersection and called in a bomb squad to investigate the cooking device, authorities said. The squad’s robot was deployed and found the rice cooker was empty and did not pose a threat.

Traffic was blocked off in the area until about 10 a.m., although pedestrians were allowed to return to the area about 9:30 a.m.

“You have to look at what happens around the world and around the country. We deal with suspicious packages a few times a month in San Francisco,” Sgt. Michael Andraychak, a San Francisco Police Department spokesman, said of the police response Thursday.

In Vacaville, police received a call about a “suspicious device” around 10 a.m. prompting the local bomb squad to quarantine the half mile between Peabody Road and Depot Street on Mason Street, said Mark Marzzaferro, spokesman for the city of Vacaville.

“It was not an explosive device,” Marzzaferro said. “It was just an old beat up rice cooker.”

Police completed their investigation of the rice cooker around noon and “everything went back to normal,” Marzzaferro said, adding that he doesn’t think there is any relation to the rice cooker incident in San Francisco.

The scare came just days after a pressure-cooker bomb went off in New York City injuring 29 people in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, the same night a similar makeshift explosive device was found nearby. A man was arrested on suspicion of planting the explosives following a police shootout in New Jersey, where another device was found and detonated by police.

Sarah Ravani and Hamed Aleaziz are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: sravabu@sfchronicle.com and haleaziz@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @SarRavani @haleaziz