NEW YORK: Flooding killed a minimum of 25 people, caught in a frenzied car, submerged subway lines, and temporarily grounded flights in ny and New Jersey because the remnants of Hurricane Ida brought torrential rains to the world.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio described the flooding and weather on Wednesday night as a “historic weather event”, and therefore the National Weather Service issued a flash flood emergency in ny City for the primary time.
Recovery efforts were under way early Thursday to bring back transportation systems serving many residents within the densely populated metropolitan area.
The governors of latest York and New Jersey, who had declared emergencies in their states on Wednesday, urged residents to remain home as crews worked to clear roadways and restore service to ny City subways and commuter rail lines. “It isn’t safe to drive,” New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy said on Twitter. “Our crews are working to clear and open roads, and that we need everyone to remain off them so crews can safely do their job.”
Ida’s remnants brought six to eight inches (15 to twenty cm) of rain to a swath of the Northeast from Philadelphia to Connecticut and set an hourly record of three .15 inches for Manhattan, breaking the previous one that was set but fortnight ago, the National Weather Service said.
The 7.13 inches of rain that fell in ny City on Wednesday was the city’s fifth highest daily amount, it said.
Right now my street looks more sort of a lake, said Lucinda Mercer, 64, as she peered out her apartment window in Hoboken, New Jersey, just across the Hudson from ny .
Mercer, who works as a crisis line fundraiser, said flood waters were lapping halfway up the hub caps of parked cars, and a few residents put plastic garbage bags over their shoes to cross the road .
Subway service in ny City remained “extremely limited” while there was no service in the least on commuter rail lines to the city’s northern suburbs on Thursday morning, the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) said. Janno Lieber, the MTA’s acting chair and CEO, told local media it had been getting to take until later within the day to revive full service. Images posted on social media overnight showed water gushing over subway platforms and trains.
The Long Island Railroad, which is additionally travel by the MTA, said early Thursday that services on most of its branches had been restored but commuters should expect systemwide delays of up to half-hour .
At least one person was killed because the flooding inundated the New Jersey City of Passaic, Mayor Hector Lora told CNN.
The vehicle the person was riding in was caught in a frenzy by the water, CNN reported.
NBC ny reported that another person had died in New Jersey and 7 had died in ny City, including a 2-year-old boy. Local media reported that folks had been trapped in their basements because the storm sent water surging through the town .
Mark Haley of Summit, New Jersey, said getting back home after a 15-minute drive to a bowling alley to celebrate his daughter’s sixth birthday on Wednesday night became a six-hour slog through flood waters that always left him trapped.
“When we got out, it had been a combat zone , said Haley, 50, a fitness trainer, who got home to seek out almost two feet (0.6 m) of water in his basement.
