Parts of New York plunge into darkness after major power outage
NEW YORK. KAZINFORM A major power outage on Saturday evening threw parts of New York in darkness, leaving people trapped on trains and in elevators before the electricity was fully restored by midnight, EFE reports.
At the peak of the outage, some72,000 customers were left without power in the West Side of Manhattan and itsneighborhoods, including the otherwise brightly lit Times Square with crowds oftourists and locals heading to theaters.
The poweroutage occurred at 8 pm local time (00.00 am GMT) and was restored at leastthree hours later.
Energycompany Con Edison said supply was mainly affected in the West Sideneighborhood in Manhattan.
Con EdisonPresident John McAvoy in a press conference said that the power supply failurewas apparently due to a problem at a substation on West 49th Street whichaffected six power sectors.
The Fire Department of the Cityof New York (FDNY) tweeted that the power failure was observed from the 72ndStreet up until West 40th Street and from the 5th Avenue until the HudsonRiver.
Firefighterswere seen helping people trapped in elevators and subway cars get out duringthe hours of outage.
The NewYork City Hall said that A, C, F, D and M subway lines were affected.
TheMetropolitan Transportation Authority said all systems were affected and hadlimited service on lines 1, 2 and 3 on the Westside, including lines 4,5 and 6on East Side and line 7 between Manhattan and Queens.
New YorkCity Mayor Bill de Blasio was on a campaign trail in Iowa for his presidentialbid during the power outage. He said from there that there were some technicalissues in the power supply systems.
Someleaders criticized his absence at the time of the blackout.
On a hotmidsummer evening, the electricity consumption shot up due to widespread use ofair conditioners.
As the cityplunged into chaos, drivers were left fend for themselves at trafficintersections with signals not working.
The policefor hours urged the residents to avoid the areas between West 42nd and 74thstreet between 15th and 12the Avenues.
At someintersections, police and civilians worked together to direct traffic.
Sometheaters were reported to have canceled their shows. People eating inrestaurants and bars were seen using smartphone flashlights.
The poweroutage took place on the same date as it had happened in the year 1977 thataffected much of the city of New York.