At 5:12 a.m. on Wednesday, April 18, 1906, the "Buford" was in San Francisco when the Great Quake of 1906 struck. She was taken from the pier into the bay to avoid the resultant fire and was one of three transports - "Buford", "Crook" and "Warren" - used in the harbor as temporary storehouses for the supplies coming into the stricken city by sea in the weeks following the disaster.