NYC Blackout Images and Captions

misc. | 8/15/03

[finnman69]

DAY TWO In Manhattan, the sun is rising but the lights are still out.

Commuters sleep on the steps of the Post Office on 33rd Street and Eighth Avenue in New York during the early hours of Friday, after being stranded by the city's electrical blackout.

A huge power failure swept through parts of the Northeast, Midwest and Canada on Thursday, shutting down trains, subways and airports from New York City to Detroit, forcing people into the streets.

At the ferry terminal on west 38th St., thousands of people without access to the subways and trains flocked to catch ferries, creating another form of gridlock.

Passengers on the downtown A train were stuck underground for two hours before being led out by MTA employees.

Waterway buses to Weehawken were filled to capacity.

Transit workers escorted riders off a subway car on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

Pedestrians clogged the Brooklyn Bridge as the power outage brought life to a standstill.

Dozens of people at the Lincoln Tunnel jumped on a truck to get a ride through the tunnel to New Jersey.The police made them all get off the truck.

The hallways of Saint Vincent's Hospital in Manhattan were dark after the blackout. Power generators lit emergency and patient care areas.

The whole of the city was dark and the setting sun painted one building.

[sarasota]

She was all over the cable networks on the phone, telling *her* story.

[Jhensy]

I detailed my night elsewhere, but I just got home to Westchester an hour ago. Slept on the floor in my office, with a pillow made of balled-up secretary's sweaters taken from the backs of their chairs (don't tell them).

Those shots of average folk forced to sleep on the sidewalk or in the gutter were no lie, just multiply them a thousand-fold. Grand Central Terminal looked like that wounded scene in Gone With the Wind, where the camera pulls back on all those soldiers.

The terrible legacy this morning was the stench of sweat and, um, 'bathroom' odor on the sidewalks, because there was absolutely no place for anyone (man, woman or child) to do their thing. Last night SUCKED, to put it mildly.

I finally caught a train home around 1:30 today, and after my wife refused to hug or kiss me (then put my clothes in the washer with a stick), I took the longest shower of my life and dried off by pressing my body all over that greatest invention in human history, the air conditioner. The working air conditioner, that is.

[finnman69]

Pedestrians walk along Broadway in Manhattan's Washington Heights neighborhood Thursday night as two New York City police officers, silhouetted at right, burn a flare and stand watch outside a Banco Popular bank branch.

The sun rises over the skyline of the Upper West Side of Manhattan as seen from Weehawken, N.J., on Friday.

Stranded commuters wait in the darkened entrance of Grand Central Station on Thursday.

People make their way down a darkened stairway at an office building in Newark, N.J., Thursday. The widespread power outage stopped the elevators.

Tomas Andreda, left, and Nancy Acosta, center, were among those who turned to a pay phone to call family from after the blackout hit New York City on Thursday.

Traffic trying to leave New York City crawls up Lexington Avenue after the blackout hit Thursday afternoon.

People scrambled at a hardware store in the Upper West Side of Manhattan, hoping to power their flashlights before nightfall.

People flock over the Brooklyn Bridge during the outage in New York on Thursday.

A police officer carries a child as transit officials and police help passengers walk along subway tracks at the Shea Stadium/Willets Point subway station in the Queens borough of New York on Thursday.

People attempt to board the back of a crowded Manhattan bus during the power outage in New York on Thursday. Buses were packed to capacity after the subway lines closed down due to the outage.

The Upper West Side of Manhattan is seen from a Weehawken, N.J., park Thursday after the largest power blackout in U.S. history rolled across a vast swath of the northern United States and southern Canada.

[finnman69]

Ron Kuby on 77 WABC was commenting on how all the stranded commuters were using the streets as toilets as there are no faciulities to accomodate them. He said it stank something fierce.

[sarasota]

That photo is stunning. Thanks.

[PianoMan]

BTTT

[NYC GOP Chick]

The zoom lens view from the 5th-floor deck of my building, looking at the masses of people walking right up the entrance to the Brooklyn Bridge.

Of course, Mayor Doofus stood in the middle of the bridge to shake people's hands and get some face time, but only served to block foot traffic and got heckled for it, from what I understand.

[finnman69]

pic 51 reminds me of last night..It was pitch black, very pretty with candles lighting up highrise windows like stars. I looked East from my terrace and saw the moon rise over blacked out East side hi-rises glowing orange low in the sky.

Stunning.

[AmericanInTokyo]

Pretty rotten day over there, I'd say. Looking at those photos of the NYC chaos and confusion. Sheesh.

Still, from the visual perspective of perhaps somebody in the pestilant Third World (India, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Guatemala, etc.), they might look at these NYC photos and say 'what's the big deal? We live this way EVERY DAY!".

They probably think Americans are weak crybabies over this whole, one-day thing. In a larger way, well, maybe they are.

A sad situation yesterday, indeed, but perhaps unfortunately now many more people truly know how nearly 2/3rds of the Earth's population actually lives out their lives every day in squalor, confusion and frustration, day-in and day-out.

I say we might want to count our blessings a little tonight, rather than curse the darkness.

[Mo1]

Of course, Mayor Doofus stood in the middle of the bridge to shake people's hands and get some face time, but only served to block foot traffic and got heckled for it, from what I understand.

Oh geez .. he didn't do that did he?

[finnman69]

You should have seen the crowd near the Lincoln tuinnel and Penn Station last night....ugly and crowded.

[finnman69]

Oh why did you have to go and take a huge dump on this thread with your third world BS!

Why cant you let this thread be what it is?!?! A collection of images from a massive emergency that affects the biggest city in the Nation and economy wise will affect the nation.