Eye of the storm: New York was among the hardest hit by Superstorm Sandy. A fire broke out in Breezy Point, Queens, destroying between 80 and 100 houses

 

Battle: More than 190 firefighters have contained the six-alarm blaze fire in the Breezy Point section, but they are still putting out some pockets of fire

 

 

 

Aftermath: A rainbow and looming clouds appear over the sky in New York’s Manhattan today after the hurricane stormed the city

 

 

 

Washed up: A resident pushes a bicycle down a street covered in beach sand due to flooding from Superstorm Sandy in Long Beach, New York

 

 

 

 

 

 

Destruction: Cars floating after being pushed out a flooded basement in the city during last night’s battering

 

 

 

 

Beached: A 168-foot water tanker, the John B. Caddell, sits on the shore Tuesday morning where it ran aground on Front Street in the Stapleton neighborhood of New York’s Staten Island

 

 

 

 

Iconic: A parking lot full of yellow cabs is flooded as a result of the 13ft wall of water which descended on the city

 

 

 

 

Transport down: A view of an entirely flooded tunnel under Battery Park. New York was among the hardest hit, with its financial heart in Lower Manhattan shuttered for a second day and seawater cascading into the still-gaping construction pit at the World Trade Center

 

 

 

 

Damaged: A building that had its facade ripped off by Hurricane Sandy – beds and radiators can be seen in the block

 

 

 

 

Emergency: President Barack Obama has declared a ‘major disaster’ in New York and Long Island. Pictured, he receives an update on the ongoing response to Hurricane Sandy, in the Situation Room of the White House, via teleconference

 

 

 

 

Wrecked: A construction site sinks into a large hole on South Street Seaport – the clean-up operation is expected to cost over £12 billion

 

 

 

 

City of water: A flooded street in the Dumbo section of Brooklyn after the city awakens to the affects of Hurricane Sandy. It hit the mainland at 6.30pm local time last night having laid waste to large parts of the coast throughout the day

 

 

 

Road blocked: Pieces of lumber displaced from a yard by rising flood waters are seen beneath Manhattan Bridge in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy

 

 

 

 

Deluge: Water floods over the barriers in New York. The city’s transit system, schools, the stock exchange and Broadway were also shut after a 13ft wall of water caused by the storm surge and high tides brought severe flooding to subways and road tunnels

 

 

 

 

Transformation: A subway station now resembles a river in one of the US’s largest cities

 

 

 

 

Power storm: The full force of the storm is evident by the way a metal shutter has been ripped from the wall

 

 

 

 

Submerged: The lobby of Verizon’s Corporate headquarters in Manhattan. The headquarter houses executive offices as well as some of the company’s key telecom equipment that supports services to New York’s financial district

 

 

 

 

Operation clean-up: Debris litters a flooded street in the Dumbo section of Brooklyn after the city awakens to the affects of Hurricane Sandy

 

 

 

 

Mission: A man clears leaves from a sewer drain in lower Manhattan to help the flooding ease

 

 

 

The storm caused the worst damage in the 108-year history of New York’s extensive subway system, according to Joseph Lhota, the chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

 

 

The city’s transit system suffered unprecedented damage, from the underground subway tunnels to commuter rails to bus garages, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said Tuesday.

 

 

‘We have no idea how long it’s going to take,’ spokeswoman Marjorie Anders said.

 

 

 

Rubble: People in Atlantic City view the area where a 2000-foot section of the ‘uptown’ boardwalk was destroyed by flooding

 

 

 

 

Sand and debris cover a part of town near the ocean in New Jersey after serious flooding ravaged the coastline

 

 

 

Today the New York governor told citizens facing power outages that it could last for several days: ‘Eat the most perishable items first: leftovers, meat, poultry & foods containing milk, cream, sour cream, or soft cheese.’

 

 

All 10 subway tunnels between Manhattan and Brooklyn were flooded during the storm, as the saltwater surge inundated signals, switches and third rails and covered tracks with sludge, she said.

 

 

The entire system wasn’t flooded and the authority was already pumping water. Workers ultimately will have to walk all the hundreds of miles of track to inspect it, she said, and it wasn’t clear how long that would take. Trains had been moved to safety before the storm.

 

 

 

Chaos: A boat moved by gushing waters rests on the tracks at Metro-North’s Ossining Station on the Hudson Line

 

 

 

Pedestrians skirt around flooded areas on the Lower East Side of Manhattan as they try to get back to normal

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pictures taken of the destruction caused by Hurricane Sandy on the Lower East side in New York

 

 

 

 

Sweep up: Workers clean up sheets of blown-out glass in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy – many store faces took a beating from the strong winds

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Left: A map showing track of Hurricane Sandy through New England, with inset showing projected rainfall totals through Wednesday night and right. mid-Atlantic states showing storm surge from the superstorm storm

 

 

 

 

Destroyed: Residents look over the remains of burned homes in the Rockaways section of New York

 

 

 

 

Desolate: Residents walk past debris by the Con Edison 14 street and Avenue C power plant on the Lower East Side on Manhattan. An electrical explosion caused a shut down of power due to high winds and flood waters

 

 

 

Mayor Bloomberg said there was just no telling when power and transit would be back, but estimated some bus service would be restored by Tuesday afternoon.

 

 

‘Clearly the challenges our city faces in the coming days are enormous,’ he said.

 

 

Water lapped over the seawall in Battery Park City, flooding rail yards, subway tracks, tunnels and roads.

 

 

Rescue workers floated bright orange rafts down flooded downtown streets, while police officers rolled slowly down the street with loudspeakers telling people to go home.

 

 

‘This will be one for the record books,’ said John Miksad, senior vice president for electric operations at Consolidated Edison, which had more than 670,000 customers without power in and around New York City.

 

 

An unprecedented 13-foot surge of seawater – 3 feet above the previous record – gushed into Gotham, inundating tunnels, subway stations and the electrical system that powers Wall Street, and sent hospital patients and tourists scrambling for safety.

 

 

 

Time to heal: City of Elmira N.Y., electrician, Nate Battle fixes a traffic light that was downed from high winds

 

 

 

 

 

Search: Aviators of the 1-150th Assault Helicopter Battalion, New Jersey National Guard, look for displaced residents along the coastline of Seaside Heights today

 

 

 

 

Livelihood damaged: A man cleans up the remains of his food store damaged by Hurricane Sandy, in New York’s South Street Seaport

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Helping hand: Jolito Ortiz, left, helps sweep water out of his friend’s apartment while cleaning up after flooding

 

 

 

 

Surveying: Rod Zindani surveys the damage to his Best Of New York Food Deli

 

 

 

 

Flooded areas: Highlighted areas show flooding in New York. An unprecedented 13-foot surge of seawater – 3 feet above the previous record – gushed into Gotham

 

 

 

 

Drifting: Hurricane Sandy, pictured today moves inland across the mid-Atlantic region after causing carnage in New York

 

 

 

 

Plan of action: Workers survey the damage from a fallen tree in lower Manhattan this morning

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Debris: A dead deer, right, is pictured with driftwood and debris left by a combination of storm surge as a man holds a battered road sign

 

 

 

 

Ripped from the ground: People pass a fallen tree in the Battery Park neighborhood of Manhattan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hope springs: An unidentified couple collect ginkgo fruit knocked from trees by the ferocious winds, as a stunning rainbow appears like an arcing message of hope over the flooded devastation of New York left in the wake of the devastating storm

 

 

 

 

Strewn across street: Debris outside flats belonging to actress Anne Hathaway and reality star Olivia Palermo’s building

 

 

 

 

Precarious: A crane attached to One57, a luxury apartment tower under construction in midtown Manhattan, hangs down after partially collapsing amid gusts from Sandy

 

 

 

 

 

Devastation: A fallen tree and power line ripped from the ground outside homes on Harvard Street in Garden City, New York

 

 

Curiosity turned to concern overnight as New York City residents watched whole neighborhoods disappear into darkness as power was cut.

 

 

The World Trade Center site was a glowing ghost near the tip of Lower Manhattan.

 

 

Residents reported seeing no lights but the strobes of emergency vehicles and the glimpses of flashlights in nearby apartments. Lobbies were flooded, cars floated and people started to worry about food.

 

 

A huge fire destroyed 80 to 100 houses in a flooded beachfront neighborhood, forcing firefighters to undertake daring rescues and injuring three people.

 

 

More than 190 firefighters contained the blaze but were still putting out some pockets of fire more than nine hours after it erupted.

 

 

 

Shock: Residents look over the remains of burned homes in the Rockaways section

 

 

 

As daylight broke, neighbors walked around aimlessly through their smoke-filled Breezy Point neighborhood, which sits on the Rockaway peninsula jutting into the Atlantic Ocean. Electrical wires dangled within feet of the street.

 

 

Officials said the fire was reported around 11 p.m. Monday in an area flooded by the superstorm that began sweeping through the city earlier.

 

 

Firefighters told WABC-TV that the water was chest high on the street, and they had to use a boat to make rescues.

 

 

They said in one apartment home, about 25 people were trapped in an upstairs unit, and the two-story home next door was ablaze and setting fire to the apartment’s roof.

 

 

Firefighters climbed an awning to get to the trapped people and took them downstairs to a boat in the street.

 

 

 

Rescued: Hospital workers evacuate a patient Deborah Dadlani from NYU Langone Medical Center during Hurricane Sandy

 

 

 

 

ighting the way: Using torches Deborah Dadlani is moved in the dark from NYU Langone Medical Center

 

 

 

 

Treatment: A patient is wheeled to an ambulance in the rain during an evacuation of New York University Tisch Medical today

 

 

 

 

 

No train service: Veronica De Souza posted this extraordinary picture (‘via ninjapito’) on Twitter of the 86th Street station with water above the platform

 

 

 

 

Extraordinary: This CCTV photo shows flood waters from Hurricane Sandy rushing in to the Hoboken PATH train station through an elevator shaft in New Jersey

 

 

 

Aid at hand: An emergency operations centre in Fairfax County, Virginia, co-ordinates the mammoth response to the severe flooding caused by Sandy

 

 

 

Video footage of the scene showed a hellish swath of tightly packed homes fully engulfed in orange flames as firefighters hauled hoses while sloshing in ankle-high water.

 

 

Many homes appeared completely flattened by the wind-whipped flames. One firefighter suffered a minor injury and was taken to a hospital.

 

 

Two civilians suffered minor injuries and were treated at the scene.

 

 

In September, the same neighborhood was struck by a tornado that hurled debris in the air, knocked out power and startled residents who once thought of twisters as a Midwestern phenomenon.

 

 

Skyscrapers swayed and creaked in winds that partially toppled a crane 74 stories above Midtown.

 

 

Right before dawn, a handful of taxis were out on the streets, though there was an abundance of emergency and police vehicles.

 

 

 

 

Time to act: President Obama has declared a ‘major disaster’ in New York and Long Island as swathes of the city woke up under water after a night of being battered by Superstorm Sandy

 

 

 

 

 

A tale of two cities: Lower Manhattan in darkness after Sandy struck damaging power and previously New York city’s famous lit-up skyline

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking down: These shocking views taken from high-rise buildings in Manhattan show the extent of flooding in New York City after it was hit by Superstorm Sandy

 

 

 

 

 

No go area: An uprooted tree blocks 7th street near Avenue D in the East Village as a result of high winds from Sandy on Monday in Manhattan, New York

 

 

The massive storm reached well into the Midwest: Chicago officials warned residents to stay away from the Lake Michigan shore as the city prepares for winds of up to 60 mph and waves exceeding 24 feet well into Wednesday.

 

 

Remnants of the former Category 1 hurricane were forecast to head across Pennsylvania before taking another sharp turn into western New York by Wednesday morning.

 

 

Although weakening as it goes, the massive storm – which caused wind warnings from Florida to Canada – will continue to bring heavy rain and local flooding, said Daniel Brown, warning coordination meteorologist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

 

 

As Hurricane Sandy closed in on the Northeast, it converged with a cold-weather system that turned it into a monstrous hybrid of rain and high wind – and even snow in West Virginia and other mountainous areas inland.

 

 

 

Skyline: Brooklyn Bridge Park pictured here after it flooded following the arrival of Sandy, which has made landfall on the East Coast of the US

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bang: This image from video provided by Dani Hart shows what appears to be a transformer exploding in lower Manhattan as seen from a building rooftop in Brooklyn

 

 

 

Bright light: This photo shows what appear to be transformers exploding after much of lower Manhattan lost power during Superstorm Sandy in New York

 

 

 

 

 

 

Flooding: Water rushes into the Carey Tunnel (previously the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel), caused by Sandy on Monday night in the financial district of New York

 

 

 

 

Flood water rushes into a below-ground carpark in New York’s Financial District

 

 

Just before it made landfall at 8 p.m. near Atlantic City, N.J., forecasters stripped Sandy of hurricane status – but the distinction was purely technical, based on its shape and internal temperature.

 

 

It still packed hurricane-force wind, and forecasters were careful to say it was still dangerous to the tens of millions in its path.

 

 

While the hurricane’s 90 mph winds registered as only a Category 1 on a scale of five, it packed ‘astoundingly low’ barometric pressure, giving it terrific energy to push water inland, said Kerry Emanuel, a professor of meteorology at MIT. .

 

 

Three of the victims were children, one just 8 years old.

 

 

Sandy, which killed 69 people in the Caribbean before making its way up the Eastern Seaboard, began to hook left at midday Monday toward the New Jersey coast.

 

 

Even before it made landfall, crashing waves had claimed an old, 50-foot piece of Atlantic City’s world-famous Boardwalk.

 

 

‘We are looking at the highest storm surges ever recorded’ in the Northeast, said Jeff Masters, meteorology director for Weather Underground, a private forecasting service.

 

 

Sitting on the dangerous northeast wall of the storm, the New York metropolitan area got the worst of it.

 

 

An explosion at a ConEdison substation knocked out power to about 310,000 customers in Manhattan, said Miksad.

 

 

‘We see a pop. The whole sky lights up,’ said Dani Hart, 30, who was watching the storm from the roof of her building in the Navy Yards.

 

 

‘It sounded like the Fourth of July,’ Stephen Weisbrot said from his 10th-floor apartment.

 

 

New York University’s Tisch Hospital was forced to evacuate 200 patients after its backup generator failed. NYU Medical Dean Robert Grossman said patients – among them 20 babies from neonatal intensive care that were on battery-powered respirators – had to be carried down staircases and to dozens of waiting ambulances.

 

 

Without power, the hospital had no elevator service, meaning patients had to be carefully carried down staircases and outside into the weather. Gusts of wind blew their blankets as nurses held IVs and other equipment.

 

 

 

Raging: More than 50 homes have been destroyed at Breezy Point in the Queens area of New York, as a result of Hurricane Sandy

 

 

 

 

 

Isolated: Jane’s Carousel, the vintage merry-go-round in Brooklyn Bridge Park, in the DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass) section of Brooklyn, is ‘basically an island now’, Instagram user Andjelicaaa said

 

 

 

New York University, Downtown and Manhattan Veterans Affairs hospitals were evacuated.

 

 

Bellevue and Coney Island hospitals have no power. There have been no storm-related fatalities in the hospitals and there are 6,100 people in city shelters.

 

 

About 670,000 homes and businesses were without power late Monday in the city and suburban Westchester County.

 

 

In Schwartz’s Brooklyn neighborhood of Red Hook, residents who ignored a mandatory evacuation order awoke to debris-strewn streets and a continued blackout. About 2 inches of mucky dirt and leaves covered streets crisscrossed by downed power lines after water sloshed 12 blocks inland.

 

 

The doors of the Fairway grocery store were blown out. Several cars left in the parking lot were shifted by flood waters overnight and were left crammed door to door.

 

 

Schwartz and her husband rode out the storm on the third floor of the residences above the Fairway and said white-capped flood waters reached at least 3 feet around the building.

 

 

“It was scary how fast the water came up,” she said.

 

 

 

Help: New York City resident Gary He posted this picture with the caption ‘Dude in snorkeling mask trying to rescue his friend in Greenpoint (Brooklyn)’

 

 

 

The facade of a four-story Manhattan building in the Chelsea neighborhood crumbled and collapsed suddenly, leaving the lights, couches, cabinets and desks inside visible from the street. No one was hurt, although some of the falling debris hit a car.

 

 

Not only was the subway shut down, but the Holland Tunnel connecting New York to New Jersey was closed, as was a tunnel between Brooklyn and Manhattan. The Brooklyn Bridge, the George Washington Bridge, the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and several other spans were closed due to high winds.

 

 

The three major airports in the New York area – LaGuardia, Newark Liberty and Kennedy – remained shut down Tuesday.

 

 

Overall, more than 13,500 flights had been canceled for Monday and Tuesday, almost all related to the storm, according to the flight-tracking service FlightAware.

 

 

A construction crane atop a $1.5 billion luxury high-rise in midtown Manhattan collapsed in high winds and dangled precariously. Thousands of people were ordered to leave several nearby buildings as a precaution, including 900 guests at the ultramodern Le Parker Meridien hotel.

 

 

Alice Goldberg, 15, a tourist from Paris, was watching television in the hotel – whose slogan is ‘Uptown, Not Uptight’ – when a voice came over the loudspeaker and told everyone to leave.

 

 

‘They said to take only what we needed, and leave the rest, because we’ll come back in two or three days,’ she said as she and hundreds of others gathered in the luggage-strewn marble lobby. ‘I hope so.’

 

 

Wall Street remained closed today and U.S. stock exchanges said they were testing contingency plans to ensure trading resumes as soon as possible this week after Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast.

 

 

U.S. markets will be closed for a second day – the first time since 1888 that the NYSE remained closed for two consecutive days due to weather. The New York Stock Exchange said contingency plans are being tested only as a safety measure.

 

 

Fire destroyed at least 50 homes Monday night in a flooded neighborhood in the Breezy Point section of the borough of Queens, where the Rockaway peninsula juts into the Atlantic Ocean.

 

 

Firefighters told WABC-TV that they had to use a boat to rescue residents because the water was chest high on the street. About 25 people were trapped in one home, with two injuries reported.

 

 

Airlines canceled around 12,500 flights because of the storm, a number that was expected to grow.

 

 

Off North Carolina, not far from an area known as ‘the Graveyard of the Atlantic,’ a replica of the 18th-century sailing ship HMS Bounty that was built for the 1962 Marlon Brando movie ‘Mutiny on the Bounty’ sank when her diesel engine and bilge pumps failed. Coast Guard helicopters plucked 14 crew members from rubber lifeboats bobbing in 18-foot seas.

 

 

 

 

 

No movement: Vehicles are submerged on 14th Street near the Consolidated Edison power plant on Monday in Manhattan, New York

 

 

 

Submerged: Instagram user ‘Jesse and Greg’ posted this incredible picture of East Village flooding in Manhattan, New York

 

 

 

Cars were flooded in the Financial District of New York as Hurricane Sandy threatens 50million people on the East Coast

 

A 15th crew member who was found unresponsive several hours after the others was later pronounced dead. The Bounty’s captain was still missing.

 

 

One of the units at Indian Point, a nuclear power plant about 45 miles north of New York City, was shut down around 10:45 p.m. Monday because of external electrical grid issues, said Entergy Corp., which operates the plant. The company said there was no risk to employees or the public.

 

 

And officials declared an ‘unusual event’ at the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in Lacey Township, N.J., the nation’s oldest, when waters surged to 6 feet above sea level during the evening.

 

 

Within two hours, the situation at the reactor – which was offline for regular maintenance – was upgraded to an alert, the second-lowest in a four-tiered warning system. Oyster Creek provides 9 percent of the state’s electricity.

 

 

In Baltimore, fire officials said four unoccupied rowhouses collapsed in the storm, sending debris into the street but causing no injuries. Meanwhile, a blizzard in far western Maryland caused a pileup of tractor-trailers that blocked the westbound lanes of Interstate 68 on slippery Big Savage Mountain near the town of Finzel.

 

 

‘It’s like a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs up here,’ said Bill Wiltson, a Maryland State Police dispatcher.

 

 

Hundreds of miles from the storm’s center, gusts topping 60 mph prompted officials to close the port of Portland, Maine, and scaring away several cruise ships.

 

 

A state of emergency in New Hampshire prompted Vice President Joe Biden to cancel a rally in Keene and Republican nominee Mitt Romney’s wife, Ann, to call off her bus tour through the Granite State.

 

 

 

Split country: The US forecast today shows a large difference between the East and West coast

 

 

 

 

Hazards: This weather map for today shows how much of the US East Coast has been hit by storm warnings as it is battered by Superstorm Sandy

 

 

 

 

Staying safe: This National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration map of the US East Coast shows the various warning levels put in place across the country

 

 

 

About 360,000 people in 30 Connecticut towns were urged to leave their homes under mandatory and voluntary evacuation orders. Christi McEldowney was among those who fled to a Fairfield shelter. She and other families brought tents for their children to play in.

 

 

‘There’s something about this storm,’ she said. ‘I feel it deep inside.’

 

 

Despite dire warnings and evacuation orders that began Saturday, many stayed put.

 

 

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie – whose own family had to move to the executive mansion after his home in Mendham, far from the storm’s center, lost power – criticized the mayor of Atlantic City for opening shelters there instead of forcing people out.

 

 

Eugenia Buono, 77, and her neighbor, Elaine DiCandio, 76, were among several dozen people who took shelter at South Kingstown High School in Narragansett, R.I. They live on Harbor Island, which is connected to the mainland by a causeway.

 

 

 

‘I’m not an idiot,’ said Buono, who survived hurricanes Carol in 1954 and Bob in 1991. ‘People are very foolish if they don’t leave.’

 

 

Reggie Thomas emerged this morning from his job as a maintenance supervisor at a prison near the overflowing Hudson River, a toothbrush in his front pocket, to find his 2011 Honda with its windows down and a foot (304 millimeters) of water inside.

 

 

‘It’s totaled,’ Thomas said, with a shrug. ‘You would have needed a boat last night.’

 

 

Today stock trading is closed in the U.S. again for a second day running – the last time the New York Stock Exchange was closed for weather was in 1985 because of Hurricane Gloria, and it will be the first time since 1888 that the exchange will have been closed for two consecutive days because of weather.

 

 

Residents in New York City spent much of yesterday trying to salvage normal routines, jogging and snapping pictures of the water while officials warned the worst of the storm had not hit. Water lapped over the seawall in Battery Park City, flooding rail yards, subway tracks, tunnels and roads.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NYC’S HISTORY OF HURRICANES

1821 Hurricane: Without modern technology, the hurricane in September, 1821, caught New Yorkers off guard when, in one hour, the tide rose 13 feet. The East River and Hudson River breached, with their waters meeting across Lower Manhattan. The area was not largely populated then, so there were few deaths

 

 

1893 Hurricane A Category 1 hurricane completely destroyed Hog Island, a resort island in southern Queens

 

 

1938 Hurricane Nearly 200 people were killed when the Category 3 hurricane swept over Long Island and into New England. It caused millions of dollars of damages in NYC, where it killed 10 people and destroyed hundreds of trees in Central Park

 

 

1954, Carol The hurricane, which had sustained winds of more than 100mph, hit eastern Long Island and caused major flooding throughout New York City

 

 

1955, Connie and Diane Rain from the two hurricanes caused flooding across the city. There were more than 200 deaths in Pennsylvania, New York and New Jersey

 

 

1960, Donna The hurricane created an 11-foot storm tide in the New York Harbor, inflicting extensive pier damage

 

 

1972, Agnes The tropical storm flooded areas from North Caroline to New York and caused 122 deaths and more than $6 billion in damage

 

 

1985, Gloria Serious damage was inflicted on Long Island

 

 

1996, Bertha The tropical storm washed out the city in July 1966

 

 

1999, Floyd The tropical storm hit New Jersey and New York with 60mph winds and dropped up to 15 inches of rain. Flash flooding forced residents from their homes

 

 

2011, Irene The hurricane was downgraded to a tropical storm just before hitting the city, which had issued mandatory evacuation orders for those living along the coast. Up to 7 inches of rain fell as winds reached 65 mph. It inflicted an estimated $100 million in damages

 

 

Source: Information from the New York City and Nassau County Offices of Emergency Management

 

 

 

 

 

 

VIDEO: Rescued from rooftops! New Jersey residents are helped by emergency services

 

VIDEO: New Yorkers daunted by Hurricane Sandy clean-up operation

 

VIDEO: Helicopters scan for people trapped in flood waters at Seaside Heights, New Jersey

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2225108/Hurricane-Sandy-2012-Obama-declares-major-disaster-New-York-39-people-die-Superstorm.html#ixzz2Aoq5vN5L

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Subject: Photos: Hurricane Sandy

 

 

Video Of ConEd Station On FDR And 14th Street Exploding

 

 

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-29/video-coned-station-fdr-and-14th-street-exploding

 

 

 

 

 

Postcards From An Underwater New York

Once the surge levees break, the water level just soars and covers everything in a “reverse Titanic” as the following pictures demonstrate:

 

 

Ground Zero (via AP)

 

 

 

 

Hoboken PATH station (via @garywhitta)

 

 

 

 

Avenue C and 13th Street (via iWitness Weather):

 

 

 

 

Lower East Side:

 

 

 

 

The Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel is flooding… (via @NewsBreaker)

 

 

 

 

The Belt Parkway fully underwater

 

 

 

 

Stunning view of the lower manhattan black out (via @nicksummers)

 

 

 

 

14th Street Transformer exploding! (via @georgeweld)

 

 

 

 

Floating Cop cars in lower east side (via David Schulz)

 

 

 

 

More as we see it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The East Coast In Pictures: The Morning After

 

 

Stunning pictures of the devastation the east coast wakes up to the morning after.

 

 

 

 

First light over Manhattan as New York wakes up on Tuesday. Much of the island is without power and much of the city remains closed. The Goldman building once again boasts the best power generators and is a true beacon of what NYC is all about.

 

 

 

 

Whitehall Subway Station (via Andrew Cuomo)

 

 

 

 

Streets in New York are littered with debris as the floodwaters subside. A record storm surge of more than 13 feet (4m) deluged lower Manhattan.

 

 

 

 

Residents continue to be evacuated from their homes along the coast. Many had chosen to ignore the mandatory evacuation notices issued on Monday.

 

 

 

 

Early morning in Cape May, New Jersey, the clear-up begins. Earthmovers clear sand from the coastal road flooded by the storm surge.

 

 

 

 

Much of New York’s public transport network was flooded. Here the waters burst through a lift shaft in a rail station in Hoboken, New Jersey. It could be days before it is fully functioning.

 

 

 

 

Firefighters were hampered by the floods in their attempts to bring under control a large fire which destroyed more than 50 homes in Queens, New York.

 

 

 

 

The damage caused by Sandy extended over a huge swathe of the East Coast. In Washington DC, early morning traffic rolls past an uprooted tree.

 

 

 

 

The replica ship HMS Bounty sinks beneath the waves off the North Carolina coast, photographed by the US Coastguard who rescued 14 people from the ship.

 

 

 

 

Buildings in Breezy Point, NY have completely burned down.

 

 

And…????

 

 

 

 

Courtesy of BBC, AP, Reuters, AFP and Getty Images

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Manhattan Goes Dark: See the Stunning Photos of NY Under Water

 

• Posted on October 29, 2012 at 10:37pm by Jason Howerton

 

 

 

 

NEW YORK, NY – OCTOBER 29: Power outage seen on October 29, 2012 in Manhattan, New York. Hurricane Sandy, which threatens 50 million people in the Mid-Atlantic area of the United States, is expected to bring days of rain, high winds and possibly heavy snow. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the closure of all New York City bus, subway and commuter rail services as of Sunday evening. (Credit: Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

 

(TheBlaze/AP) — Much of New York was plunged into darkness Monday by a superstorm that overflowed the city’s historic waterfront, flooded the financial district and subway tunnels and cut power to nearly a million people.

 

 

 

 

The city had shut its mass transit system, schools, the stock exchange and Broadway and ordered hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers to leave home to get out of the way of the superstorm Sandy as it zeroed in on the nation’s largest city.

 

 

 

 

Residents spent much of the day trying to salvage normal routines, jogging and snapping pictures of the water while officials warned the worst of the storm had not hit.

 

 

 

 

By evening, a record 13-foot storm surge was threatening Manhattan’s southern tip, howling winds had sent a crane hanging from a high-rise, and utilities deliberately darkened part of downtown Manhattan to avoid storm damage.

 

 

 

 

Water lapped over the seawall in Battery Park City, flooding rail yards, subway tracks, tunnels and roads. Rescue workers floated bright orange rafts down flooded downtown streets, while police officers rolled slowly down the street with loudspeakers telling people to go home.

 

 

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Here are some of the phenomenal photos that have emerged so far:

 

 

 

(AP)

 

 

 

 

Manhattan goes dark. (AP)

 

 

 

 

(Business Insider)

 

 

 

 

Water floods a grocery story near Battery Park in Manhattan (Twitter/Business Insider)

 

 

 

 

(Business Insider)

 

 

 

 

NEW YORK, NY – OCTOBER 29: People take photographs in flood water in the Meatpacking District on October 29, 2012 in Manhattan, New York. Hurricane Sandy, which threatens 50 million people in the Mid-Atlantic area of the United States, is expected to bring days of rain, high winds and possibly heavy snow. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the closure of all New York City bus, subway and commuter rail services as of Sunday evening. (Credit: Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

NEW YORK, NY – OCTOBER 29: Power outage seen on October 29, 2012 in Manhattan, New York. Hurricane Sandy, which threatens 50 million people in the Mid-Atlantic area of the United States, is expected to bring days of rain, high winds and possibly heavy snow. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the closure of all New York City bus, subway and commuter rail services as of Sunday evening. (Credit: Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

NEW YORK, NY – OCTOBER 29: Rising water, caused by Hurricane Sandy, rushes into a subterranian parking garage on October 29, 2012, in the Financial District of New York, United States. Hurricane Sandy, which threatens 50 million people in the eastern third of the U.S., is expected to bring days of rain, high winds and possibly heavy snow. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the closure of all New York City will bus, subway and commuter rail service as of Sunday evening. (Credit: Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

 

“Now it’s really turning into something,” said Brian Damianakes, taking shelter in an ATM vestibule and watching a trash can blow down the street in Battery Park.

 

 

 

 

Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Monday night that the surge was expected to recede by midnight, after exceeding an original expectation of 11 feet.

 

 

 

 

“The worst of the weather has come,” he said. He said New Yorkers were inundating the 911 system and getting stranded in cars, and urged people to stay put until the storm passed.

 

 

 

 

“You have to stay wherever you are. Let me repeat that. You have to stay wherever you are,” he said.

 

 

Shortly after the massive storm made landfall in southern New Jersey, Consolidated Edison cut power deliberately to about 6,500 customers in downtown Manhattan to avert further damage. Then, huge swaths of the city went dark, losing power to 250,000 customers in Manhattan, Con Ed spokesman Chris Olert said.

 

 

 

 

New York University’s hospital lost backup power, Bloomberg said.

 

 

 

 

Another 1 million customers lost power earlier Monday in New York City, the northern suburbs and coastal Long Island, where floodwaters swamped cars, downed trees and put neighborhoods under water.

 

 

The storm had only killed one New York City resident by Monday night, a man who died when a tree fell on his home in the Flushing section of Queens.

 

 

 

 

The rains and howling winds, some believed to reach more than 95 mph, left a crane hanging off a luxury high-rise in midtown Manhattan, causing the evacuation of hundreds from a posh hotel and other buildings. Inspectors were climbing 74 flights of stairs to examine the crane hanging from the $1.5 billion.

 

 

 

 

Here are some additional photos, some of which, as Business Insider notes, have not been confirmed as authentic at this point:

 

 

 

This is supposedly video of a PATH station flooding (Business Insider)

 

 

 

 

Brooklyn Battery Tunnel (Business Insider)

 

 

 

 

(Business Insider)

 

 

 

 

Manhattan deals with superstorm Sandy (Business Insider)

 

 

 The facade of a four-story Manhattan building in the Chelsea neighborhood crumbled and collapsed suddenly, leaving the lights, couches, cabinets and desks inside visible from the street. No one was hurt, although some of the falling debris hit a car.

 On coastal Long Island, floodwaters swamped cars, downed trees and put neighborhoods under water as beachfronts and fishing villages bore the brunt of the storm. A police car was lost rescuing 14 people from the popular resort Fire Island.

 The city shut all three of its airports, its subways, schools, stock exchanges, Broadway theaters and closed several bridges and tunnels throughout the day as the weather worsened.

 On Long Island, floodwaters had begun to deluge some low-lying towns and nearly 150,000 customers had lost power. Cars floated along the streets of Long Beach and flooding consumed several blocks south of the bay, residents said.

 Gov. Andrew Cuomo, holding a news conference on Long Island where the lights flickered and his mike went in and out, said most of the National Guards deployed to the New York City area would go to Long Island.

“Long Island has become more and more vulnerable and the primary area of our concentration,” he said.

The center the storm, a combination of Sandy, a wintry system from the West and cold air streaming from the Arctic, threatened to knock out the underground network of power, phone and high-speed Internet lines that are the lifeblood of America’s financial capital.

 The Most Incredible Hurricane Sandy Photos from Overnight and This Morning

 

• Posted on October 30, 2012 at 8:48am by Liz Klimas

 

Hurricane Sandy’s devastation along the northern East Coast, including New York City, has left millions without power and underwater. We’ve compiled the most incredible photos we found from overnight and this morning. Be sure to check back, as this post will be updated.

 

 

 

Ground Zero’s construction site goes under feet of sea water. (Photo: AP)

 

 

 

 

Water rushes into the Carey Tunnel (previously the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel), caused by Hurricane Sandy. (Photo: Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

Power outage seen on October 29, 2012 in Manhattan, New York. (Photo: Allison Joyce/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

Subway station flooding as seen by a surveillance camera. (Photo via Business Insider)

 

 

 

See more photos from New York City last night and read about the power outages and flooding in Jason Howerton’s post on TheBlaze here.

 

 

 

 

Although mainstream professional photographers have been documenting the storm from its inception and will continue to do so into its aftermath, everyday citizens have snapped stunning images of the historic storm as well. There was even a spinoff of the popular photo filter and sharing site Instagram called “Instacane” (Editor’s note: some on the website are photoshopped, while others are legitimate). Here are a couple.

 

 

 

34th and 1st street in New York City. (Photo: pelukinho/Instagram)

 

 

 

 

Flooding in Avenue C parking garage. (Image: Time/@michaelchristopherbrown/Instagram)

 

 

 

Here’s a few more images from Flickr photograhers:

 

 

 

New York’s East River during the blackout. (Photo: lookcatalog/Flickr)

 

 

 

 

Hurricane Sandy at Broadway and LaSalle in New York City. (Photo: Paul Lowry/Flickr)

 

 

 

 

Abandoned streets at the hurricane “wound down” in the early Tuesday morning hours. (Photo: moishfiriedman/Flickr)

 

 

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These are from Weather.com.

 

 

 

Davis, West Virginia (Photo: iWitness/baltotodd)

 

 

West Virginia pelted with snow. (Photo: Facebook/Cheryl Clay)

Jesse Schafer and Greg McHale, who run the website On the Real NY (via Instagram), have many photographs of the storm Monday night and into Tuesday. Given that there are a slew of fake photos from the storm circulating on the web (check those out here), there have been questions raised about the validity of the On the Real NY photos, given that they look very bright during a night storm that was supposedly in a blackout. On Instagram, the photos have been defended with some saying a long-exposure technique was used to let more light in.

 

 

 

(Photo: Jesse Schafer and Greg McHale/OntheRealNY)

 

 

 

 

(Photo: Jesse Schafer and Greg McHale/OntheRealNY)

 

 

 

 

 

Speaking of fake photos though, Steve Kastenbaum tweeted the below photo of a traffic sign bent from the storm. Do you believe it?

 

 

 

(Photo: Twitter/@SKastenbaumCNN)

 

 

 

Time-lapsed videos are being created as well. Check out this one compiled from photos from the New York Times’ live webcam running from the early morning hours of Monday through 7:45 a.m. Tuesday:

 

 

CNN pulled together this compilation of video clips of the storm at various locations:

 

 

Early morning photos of the aftermath are trickling in as well.

 

 

 

People come out to see the heavy surf that was caused by Hurricane Sandy, on October 30, 2012 in Cape May, New Jersey. (Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

Power appears to remain out at New York City’s Flatiron building. (Photo: lvlewitinn/Instagram)

 

 

 

 

The lights on the Brooklyn Bridge stand in contrast to the lower Manhattan skyline which has lost its electrical supply, Tuesday, Oct. 30. (Photo: AP/Mark Lennihan)

 

 

 

 

Debris litter a flooded street in the Dumbo section of Brooklyn after the city awakens to the affects of Hurricane Sandy on October 30. (Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

A fallen tree lies along the side of 14th St NW following Hurricane Sandy’s track through the nation’s capital on Tuesday. (Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

Water floods the Plaza Shops in the wake of the storm. (Photo: Allison Joyce/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

A boat is seen on the tracks of Metro-North’s Ossining Station on the Hudson Line. (Photo: MTA/Flickr via Gothamist)

 

 

 

And work for restoration has already begun.

 

 

 

Earth movers clean sand off the road which was brought in from Hurricane Sandy, on October 30 in Cape May, NJ. (Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

Public workers shovel debris from the streets in Ocean City, Maryland. (Photo: JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

David Dodds clears debris from the front of Water Ways Marina in Ocean City. (Photo: JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)