Sandy loses 'hurricane' title, keeps powerful punch

The massive storm was downgraded just after it barged ashore in southern New Jersey, bringing 90-mph winds and a roiling wall of seawater as it moved inland and north toward New York City. It sent 90-mph gusts through the Wall Street canyons and water surging to a record 13 feet in Lower Manhattan, surging into two major commuter tunnels and into subway stations and tracks. It was unclear how much water had come in.

The MTA also cut power to some subway tunnels in lower Manhattan, after water came into the stations and tracks. The MTA couldn't say at this point how much damage had been done, and how much time it would take to restore everything to normal.

Consolidated Edison was prompted to cut power to part of the area to avoid storm damage. Manhattan's FDR Drive was under water south of 20th Street. The storm was expected to lash the nation's biggest city -- and surrounding metro area - until midnight.

Fatal car crashes in Maryland and West Virginia, and the death of a man in Queens, N.Y., when a tree fell on his home were blamed on the storm. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's office confirmed at least four other storm-related deaths in the state. The hurricane-turned-post-tropical cyclone, still a powerful, 900-mile-wide hybrid of several weather systems, sent 30-foot-high swells toward the Garden State, and as its eye passed over the shoreline, a surge as high as 10 feet tore into dunes and washed across boardwalks.

All the media care about is where they work and live, . Places in WV, western PA ,KY OH etc are getting hit too but alas they are not where these elitist media types work and live so they don;t really care about these states.

The storm is hitting here and there, mostly about NJ, NY and then moving out westward.
Now the storm has hit I see only reports of where it hit in NY, NJ not the other states which it is hitting right now.

We’ve had no power here in FL for two weeks , in humid hot temps, but we got on with it, we had a tree down on some power lines and a neighbor went out with a chain saw and cut it down. We;’ve had no water for over a week but I don;t ever see FOX and others reporting that.

Wildfires in TX and here last year and south GA, nothing, flooding in TN and hardly nothing, tornado’s which hit a lot in a lot fo places and hardly nothing.

I expect sand being washed up, branches coming down, some trees even, power out,after all it was a storm but lets not kid ourselves that this was Andrew and Katrina all in one.

This storm is news because it hit a part of the country which does nto see much of this so the people there will be all in a dizzy and because this is where the media live and work.

When I see reporters harping on as if this was a cat 5 , hell even a 3 then see lights on, a branch down and some sand thrown up ontothe boardwalk whilst people walk their dogs behind the reporter then it puts it into persepective.

Saw one post on here saying people were running for their lives[shakes head]
It’s as if a tidal wave came crashing over and wiped out much of the north east coast

much like Katrina in that some areas will be hit very very hard and just a mile or two away, very little

That seems to be Sandy all right, but you don't understand Katrina at all. Katrina's destruction extended for miles. Along the MS coast, the zone of total destruction extended over a mile from the coast. I saw entire ranks of large trees toppled like toothpicks, in Laurel, MS -- over 100 miles from the coast (that town was still w/o power six days after the storm, btw). In New Orleans, the flooding went on for miles, so that escape from a flooded area was not the matter of wading a few blocks or a 5 minute boat ride, but a mission requiring scores of airboats and helicopters, flying from first light till after nightfall, for over a week. Even the approaches to NOLA were damaged or destroyed, so that all traffic had to enter through just two choke points. And remember that there was no electrical service to speak of for up to 100 miles. Last night in NYC, no one was surrounded by water, those who had to get out could wade 1,000 feet or so and find themselves on dry land, with all the comforts of modern technology. It was bad if you were flooded or had a fire, and my heart goes out to them. But for 90% of New Yorkers, this end-of-the-world frankenstorm was just a stormy night.

Katrina was a large storm too, with a record-setting storm surge roughly twice what Sandy pushed. Sandy's distinction is her (unprecedented?) size, which brought rough weather to tens of millions. NJ seems to have taken most of the high winds and consequently suffered most of the power loss. That is no fun, but at least those homes are otherwise habitable in almost every case. People can drive out and return with charcoal, lanterns, camp stoves, full gas tanks, cash from a working ATM, and fresh supplies. Their biggest problem is that they have no way to vacuum the house or do laundry. And I can promise that living in an unpowered house at 50 degrees is a lot more bearable than one at 95. They'll live.

This morning a spoke to a fellow in Connecticut who had lost his power. He had a generator and access to all the gas he needed. He was stunned when I told him my post-Katrina house was off the grid for a month. People who weren't here will probably never grasp the logistical challenges we had to face. Every day I drive past houses that are still uninhabited to this day.

"Hello?... I want to report a sewage back-up... I sent my Vietnamese house boy in but he only found poo..."

Li An Fo and his "partner" search for their yellow submarine

Well.. there's your problem!...

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