Sandy strikes - Superstorm batters US East Coast

 

Water rushes into the Carey Tunnel (previously the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel), caused by Hurricane Sandy, October 29, 2012, in the Financial District of New York. (AFP Photo / Andrew Burton)

Source: Russia Today

http://rt.com/usa/news/sandy-hurricane-hits-east-528/

The center of superstorm Sandy has reached the US state of New Jersey. The hurricane, which was downgraded to the “post-tropical” storm, has caused 13 deaths and left over 6 million along the East Coast without power.

­The storm, packing torrential rains and wind, made landfall along the New Jersey coast near Atlantic City, the National Hurricane Center says.

Earlier, the NHC said the category 1 Hurricane Sandy had lost tropical characteristics, becoming a “post-tropical cyclone” with maximum sustained winds near 85 mph and gusts reaching 115 mph.

The storm has heavily affected many parts of New York City, with power outages and several feet of water hitting large areas of Manhattan and Brooklyn.

The Statue of Liberty's torch has gone out, apparently due to extreme weather conditions.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg warned that conditions are expected to worsen, urging New Yorkers to stay inside. “Conditions outside are dangerous, and they are only going to get worse in the hours ahead,” he told a press conference.

 

Power has gone out in much of Lower Manhattan. (Image from twitter user@alananewhouse)

At least 13 people have been killed by the disaster, according to AP. Casualties were reported in New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Connecticut.

One woman has been killed by a falling sign in Toronto as high winds reached Canada.

New York City's Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced that subway and bus networks are suspended and will remain closed for an unknown period of time. “Service will be restored only when it is safe to do so, and after careful inspections of all equipment, tracks and other sub-systems and bus routes. Even with minimal damage this is expected to be a lengthy process,” the MTA said in a statement.

MTA Chairman Joseph Lhota told WABC Television that subway service could be crippled for “at least a week.”

There have been reports that the main building of Brooklyn's Coney Island Hospital is on fire. Emergency services cannot reach the site, as the streets surrounding the hospital are flooded, Sheepshead Bites news blog reports.

Meanwhile, social networks users on Manhattan's Lower East Side have reported a "huge explosion" that preceded the neighborhood's power going out. Lower Manhattan now appears to be without electricity across the board after an apparent blast at the power transformer.

 

Pedestrians walk past a submerged taxi in Brooklyn, New York, October 29, 2012 as Hurricane Sandy made landfall in the northeastern United States. Hurricane Sandy began battering the U.S. (Reuters/Gary He)

­As the storm pounds the East Coast, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission has declared an ‘Alert’ at a power plant in Oyster Creek, New Jersey.

“The plant, currently in a regularly scheduled outage, declared the Alert at approximately 8:45 p.m. EDT due to water exceeding certain high water level criteria in the plant’s water intake structure,” it said in a statement.

 

Fire fighters evaluate the scene of an apartment building which had the front wall collapse due to Hurricane Sandy on October 29, 2012 in New York, United States. (Andrew Burton/Getty Images/AFP )

 

Flooded cars, caused by Hurricane Sandy, are seen on October 29, 2012, in the Financial District of New York, United States. (AFP Photo / Andrew Burton)

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

 

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16 dead, over 6mn without power on East Coast

 

A blacked out New York City skyline Monday night, as power goes down for much of the city

Source: Press TV

http://www.presstv.ir/usdetail/269487.html

Monster Storm Sandy slammed into the East Coast Monday, killing at least 16 people, hurling a record-breaking 13-foot surge of seawater at New York City and knocking out power to over 6 million people.

The massive storm was downgraded from a hurricane after it barged ashore in southern New Jersey, bringing more than 85-mph winds and a roiling wall of seawater as it moved through New York City. It sent water surging into two major commuter tunnels and into subway stations and tracks. It was unclear how much water had come in.

The 16 deaths were reported in New Jersey, New York, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. Some of the victims were killed by falling trees. Police in Toronto said a woman was killed by a falling sign as high winds closed in on Canada's largest city.

The power was out for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers and an estimated 6.2 million people altogether across the East, with the full extent of the storm's damage across the region unclear and unlikely to be known until daybreak.

The MTA 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. A large portion of Manhattan's FDR Drive was under water.

Reuters reported late Monday that there had been an explosion at a Consolidated Edison power station on the east side of Manhattan. Despite earlier reports, ConEd said on Twitter no one was trapped inside the plant.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg says backup power has been lost at New York University hospital and the city is working to move people out. The mayor delivered a news conference Monday night and said rain was tapering off in the city and the storm surge was expected to recede by midnight. The hospital complex is near the East River in an area of lower Manhattan where flooding has been reported.

The hurricane-turned-post-tropical cyclone, still a powerful, 900-mile-wide hybrid of several weather systems, sent 30-foot-high swells toward New Jersey, and as its eye passed over the shoreline, a surge as high as 10 feet tore into dunes and washed across boardwalks.

The state had evacuated all shore towns ahead of the strike, with Gov. Chris Christie telling residents who ignored the evacuation orders they were "both stupid and selfish."

"[It's a] very intense, very dangerous storm. People will die in this storm," Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley said Monday. "So folks will need to mind their families, stay home and hunker down."

Even homes on stilts were threatened by the massive surge, and water was cresting dunes and boardwalks from Delaware's Rehoboth Beach to Jones Beach in New York.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo shut down all major New York bridges and schools, airports and the New York Stock Exchange were closed for Tuesday. North of Atlantic City, the storm was expected to be at maximum force from about 7 p.m. to 11 p.m., with gusts up to 90 mph, especially on ocean-facing beaches. For Long Island, Connecticut, and the rest of coastal New England, the high impact winds could last until midnight, according to The Wall Street Journal’s Weather Journal.

The National Guard was deployed along the densely-populated Atlantic Coast, and airports shut down Monday afternoon as the massive system churned in from the sea, creating 30-foot swells off the Jersey shore. The storm is on a collision course with a winter storm and a cold front, and high tides from a full moon make it a rare hybrid storm that could be felt all the way to the Great Lakes. Still, it could be worse – the storm could be well inland when evening high tide comes, some six hours after landfall.

Sandy has already been blamed for 69 deaths in the Caribbean before it began traveling northward, parallel to the Eastern Seaboard.

In Washington, President Obama urged the millions in Sandy’s path to heed warnings from local and state officials.

“When they tell you to evacuate, you need to evacuate,” Obama said. “Don't delay, don't pause, don't question the instructions that are being given because this is a powerful storm."

States of emergency were declared from North Carolina, where gusty winds whipped steady rain on Sunday, to Connecticut. Delaware ordered mandatory evacuations for coastal communities on Sunday, while Ocean City, Md., also was evacuated.

Tens of thousands of people were ordered to evacuate in anticipation of the storm, including 375,000 in lower Manhattan and other parts of New York City. At least 50,000 were ordered to evacuate in Delaware alone and 30,000 in Atlantic City, N.J., where the city's 12 casinos were forced to shut down for only the fourth time in the 34-year history of legalized gambling there.

Airlines canceled more than 8,962 flights and Amtrak suspended passenger train service across the Northeast for Monday and Tuesday.

New York and Philadelphia shut down their subways, buses and commuter trains Sunday night and announced that schools would be closed on Monday. Boston, Washington and Baltimore also called off school. In Washington and New Jersey, Metrorail and PATH train services were canceled.

In Connecticut, the number of power outages began climbing as the storm moved through the state. In New York City, 250,000 homes were reported to be without power. Fox News

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NYPD, Microsoft launch all-seeing ‘Domain Awareness System’

Source: Press TV

http://www.presstv.ir/usdetail/255230.html

The New York Police Department has a new terrorism detection system that will also generate profit for the city.

The New York Police Department is embracing online surveillance in a wide-eyed way.

Representatives from Microsoft and the NYPD announced the launch of their new Domain Awareness System (DAS) at a Lower Manhattan press conference Wednesday. Using DAS, police are able to monitor thousands of CCTV cameras around the five boroughs, scan license plates, find out the kind of radiation cars are emanating, and extrapolate info on criminal and terrorism suspects from dozens of criminal databases ... all in near-real time.

New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly first announced that Microsoft had the NYPD's Domain Awareness System under development at the Aspen Security Forum in July. Microsoft has quietly become one of the world's largest providers of integrated intelligence solutions for police departments and security agencies. Although DAS is officially being touted as an anti-terrorism solution, it will also give the NYPD access to technologies that-depending on the individual's perspectives-veer on science fiction or Big Brother to combat street crime.

The City of New York and Microsoft will be licensing DAS out to other cities; according to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, New York City's government will take a 30% cut of any profits. "Citizens do not like higher taxes, so we [find other revenue outlets," said Bloomberg. Bloomberg continued that "I hope Microsoft sells a lot of copies of this system, because 30% of the profits will go to us." fastcompany.com

HIGHLIGHTS

Imagine a 911 caller alerts police to a suspicious vehicle: The Domain Awareness System could then automatically track that vehicle with the city's network of cameras and smart license plate readers as well as figure out where the vehicle's been in the past and possibly determine information about the driver, all while feeding that information to police.

The DAS can also figure out who left behind a suspicious package, map historical criminal activity and identify the source of radiation in the event of a possible attack.

"This new system capitalizes on new powerful policing software that allows police officers and other personnel to more quickly access relevant information gathered from existing cameras, 911 calls, previous crime reports and other existing tools and technology," said Mayor Bloomberg of the system. "It will help the NYPD do more to prevent crimes from occurring and help them respond to crimes even more effectively."

New York City touted the DAS as a counter terrorism measure in a press release. However, data collected by the system can be used "for a legitimate law enforcement or public safety purpose," per the city's guidelines.

Additionally, monitoring of the city's streets will occur 24 hours a day in some parts of lower Manhattan, video will be held for 30 days unless archived and license plate information will be saved for five years. Combined, these factors may cause the system to become the target of severe blowback from privacy groups. mashable.com

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