Pretty much all of Manhattan below East 31st, and West 39th, is experiencing severe flooding, loss of power and utility outages. Frighteningly, this includes two tremendous hospitals - Bellevue, on the East Side, and NYU Langone Medical Center. Both evacuated patients in ICU wards, including infants, due to loss of power. Swathes of Brooklyn, Queens and New Jersey experienced similarly crippling floods and outages.
The subway service and commuter rail lines serving NYC and the immediate surrounding areas remain closed. Pictures of serious flooding at numerous subway stations are all over Facebook, Twitter and traditional news media websites. (The NY Times site has some amazing shots - in every sense of the word.) Buses are due to begin covering essential routes this afternoon, according to Governor Cuomo, but the lifeblood - the subways - are still an unknown quantity to the general public. Estimates put the recovery time anywhere between 14 hours and 5 days, depending on the extent of the damage to signal equipment, especially in tunnels under the East River.
Better news:
Bridges reopened this afternoon.
In true NYC fashion, many grocery stores, drug stores and restaurants are open, and some (like the Harlem Fairway) are providing bus pickup and dropoff, or taxi reimbursement, for employees. Bars are also open, and I've heard a few Facebook stories of bars opening up restrooms and power strips so folks without water or power at home can use the facilities, and charge their devices to contact loved ones and colleagues.
