It was the race against the elements, to pass before the arrival of the storm Ida which reached the East Coast of the United States, Wednesday 1er September. In the afternoon, the landing on the Andrews base, near Washington, coming from Guantanamo was done in extremis, and it was necessary to wait half an hour because of a tornado warning. From Washington, Amtrak’s trains were still on time, but on the way constantly sounded weather warnings, in English and Spanish, urging them to take shelter. When the windswept train arrived in New York at around 7 p.m., it was raining like never before. Around 10 p.m. in Manhattan, the living room furniture had to be moved, as water seeped through the floor. The next day, the sun was shining, but school was canceled, the television stranded.
Not all were so well off in New York, when Central Park rained 18.26 centimeters of water in twelve hours, twice as much as the previous record, which dated back to 1927 (the equivalent of three months rain in Paris). Water has flooded the streets turned into torrents and invaded the basements of Queens and Brooklyn, where illegals sometimes live in cellars serving as makeshift apartments.
At least 20 people have died in New York and neighboring New Jersey, including eight people trapped in their basement homes surrounded by water in the borough of Queens. Among them, a 2-year-old boy and an 86-year-old woman. One person drowned in his car while five others were found lifeless in Elizabeth, New Jersey. A tornado destroyed a housing estate in this small state. Two hundred passengers stranded on a train on the Newark Airport side of New York City had to be rescued overnight, as did a bus in the Staten Island neighborhood, whose passengers were standing on the seats. the water had risen so much.
Interruption of public transport
The Film Forum, an arthouse cinema which broadcast The swimming pool, by Jacques Deray, with Alain Delon and Romy Schneider, was inundated, leading his audience to joke about this “3D experience”. Water spilled into New York City public transportation, leading to their complete shutdown overnight. In the morning, service resumed painfully with delays on nine lines, partial suspension on thirteen and complete on two lines, while Amtrak rail traffic between Philadelphia and Boston was interrupted.
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