Not only was the New York subway shut down, but the Holland Tunnel connecting New York to New Jersey

Aa Aa Aa Aa Aa Sea water floods the Ground Zero construction site Monday in New York. Sandy continued on its path Monday, as the storm forced the shutdown of mass transit, schools and financial markets, sending coastal residents fleeing, and threatening a dangerous mix of high winds and soaking rain. (AP photo)
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. Superstorm Sandy slammed into the New Jersey coastline with 80 mph winds Monday night and hurled an unprecedented 13-foot surge of seawater at New York City, flooding its tunnels, subway stations and the electrical system that powers Wall Street. At least 10 U.S. deaths were blamed on the storm, which brought the presidential campaign to a halt a week before Election Day.
Still, discount hotels brussels the power was out for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers and an estimated 5.2 million people altogether across the East. And the full extent of the storm s damage across the region was unclear, and unlikely to be known until daybreak.
In addition, heavy rain and further flooding remain major threats over the next couple of days as the storm makes its way into Pennsylvania and up into New York State. Near midnight, the center of the storm was just outside Philadelphia, and its winds were down to 75 mph, just barely hurricane strength.
It was nerve-racking for a while, before the storm hit. Everything was rattling, said Don Schweikert, who owns a bed-and-breakfast discount hotels brussels in Cape May, N.J., near where Sandy roared ashore. I don t see anything wrong, but I won t see everything until morning.
As the storm closed in, it converged with a cold-weather system that turned it into a superstorm, a monstrous hybrid consisting not only of rain and high wind but snow in West Virginia and other mountainous areas inland.
Just before Sandy reached land, forecasters stripped it of hurricane discount hotels brussels status, but the distinction was purely technical, based on its shape and internal temperature. discount hotels brussels It still packed hurricane-force wind, and forecasters were careful discount hotels brussels to say it was still dangerous to the tens of millions in its path.
In an attempt discount hotels brussels to lessen damage from saltwater to the subway system and the electrical network beneath the city s financial district, New York City s main utility cut power to about 6,500 customers in lower Manhattan. But a far wider swath of the city was hit with blackouts caused by flooding and transformer explosions.
The city s transit agency said water surged into two major commuter tunnels, the Queens Midtown and the Brooklyn-Battery, and it cut power to some subway tunnels in lower Manhattan after water flowed into the stations and onto the tracks.
The surge hit New York City hours after a construction crane atop a luxury high-rise discount hotels brussels collapsed in the wind and dangled precariously discount hotels brussels 74 floors discount hotels brussels above the street. Forecasters said the wind at the top the building may have been close to 95 mph.
President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney canceled their campaign appearances at the very height of the race, with just over a week to go before Election Day. The president pledged the government s help and made a direct plea from the White House to those in the storm s path.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said people were stranded in Atlantic City, which sits on a barrier island. He accused the mayor of allowing them to stay there. With the hurricane roaring through, Christie warned it was no longer safe for rescuers, and advised people who didn t evacuate discount hotels brussels the coast to hunker down until morning.
While the hurricane s 90 mph winds registered as only a Category 1 on a scale of five, it packed astoundingly low barometric pressure, giving it terrific discount hotels brussels energy to push water inland, said Kerry Emanuel, a professor of meteorology at MIT.
We are looking at the highest storm surges ever recorded in the Northeast, said Jeff Masters, meteorology discount hotels brussels director for Weather Underground, a private forecasting service. The energy of the storm surge is off the charts, basically.
Off North Carolina, a replica of the 18th-century sailing ship HMS Bounty that was built for the 1962 Marlon Brando movie Mutiny on the Bounty went down in the storm, and 14 crew members were rescued by helicopter from rubber discount hotels brussels lifeboats bobbing in 18-foot discount hotels brussels seas. Another crew member was found hours later but was unresponsive. The captain was missing.
When I think about how much water is already in the streets, and how much more is going to come with high tide tonight, this is going to be devastating, said Bob McDevitt, president of the main Atlantic City casino workers discount hotels brussels union. I think this is going to be a really bad situation tonight.
Not only was the New York subway shut down, but the Holland Tunnel connecting New York to New Jersey was closed, as was a tunnel between Brooklyn and Manhattan. The Brooklyn Bridge, the George discount hotels brussels Washington Bridge, the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and several other spans were closed because of high winds.
McClam reported from New York. AP Science Writer Seth Borenstein contributed to this report from Washington. Associated Press writers Allen G. Breed in Raleigh, N.C.; David Porter in Pompton Lakes, N.J.; Wayne Parry in Point Pleasant Beach, N.J.; and David Dishneau in Delaware also contributed.
This is going to be tough to recover from. Thousands of lives are changed forever. Memories are born that will last a lifetime. What happened was impressive and shows the power of weather. As I said before, the media usually sensationalizes these type of storms. In this case they got it exactly right. Bravo! I wonder how many didn t evacuate and placed themselves in peril because they went through other overhyped storms that turned to be nothing. Those who stayed were fools, anticipating a storm like Irene, when this was clealy more powerful. Their selfishness put 1st responders in danger. Report
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