My Blackout Experience

Well, it's now Monday afternoon and routine has seemed to return to my life. Last week was an unusual one, to say the least.
I had some German friends stay at my place last week. They arrived after midnight Tuesday night and were scheduled to leave on Thursday evening. They're a couple; Anja was my neighbor during my 3rd year at NYU Law. She and her boyfriend were visiting California and her brother's wedding was on Saturday in Germany. My roommate was in California for his sister's wedding, so I gave the Germans my bed and I crashed on top of my roommate's bed.

Thursday, 8/14/2003, 4:10 pm.
Part 1 - Drinks on 5th
I'm at work, a normal day, when I hear a strange humming sound. A few seconds later, the lights go down and out, but come back up immediately. My computer went down, but the computer being used by a woman who sits near me never completely lost power. We soon figured out that the strange humming was our building's back-up generator kicking in. A guy in an office behind me was on a conference call with our branch in NJ, so we immediately knew that Jersey was affected by the 'blip' also. Someone looked out the windows (we're on the 6th floor) and noticed that the traffic lights were all down, and people were looking out of the windows of the hotel across the street. People started calling around and we discovered that Queens was down, as was upstate NY.
People started getting worried, some thinking this was another attack. We heard that Detroit had lost power... I called Dad in PA, but he was unaffected. I called back and asked him to put on CNN to check the news.
The newswires (CNN, MSNBC, FoxNEWS, Yahoo, New York 1, 1010wins (our traffic a.m. station)) all took what seemed to me like a long time to report anything. I called JP in San Diego and left him a message asking him to keep an eye on the news.
By this point, cell phone reception was down, on pretty much every carrier (Verizon, AT&T, T-mobile, etc.). People had all called at once, jamming the cells.
I was a bit nervous at this point, but as time went on, it seemed like this was a major, but unplanned, occurrence (not another attack). The 'assistants' (i.e., secretaries) near me all have children, none in Manhattan, so they were the first to leave. Most came back within an hour, as they were planning to take a taxi, train, etc. to get out of the City, but, of course, everyone else had this same idea at the same time.
I thought of staying in the office, since we had A/C, internet access, vending machines, water, toilets, lights, couches, etc., especially since some on the internet noted that sundown was 7:55, but I was getting bored.
I went down to our lobby, where the lighting was muted, but our key-card driven turnstiles were working, security was present, so things seemed normal, except for the dozens of people who had come into the lobby to escape the heat.
The streets were crowded with all kinds of people; many of the men who were wearing ties (like me) also had a beer in each hand, and were hanging out. The atmosphere was very much like 2 years ago, except without the fear and panic.
I walked down to a deli next to Grand Central, where there was a line to get in. An employee would admit one or two people at a time, with about a dozen inside at a time. Almost pitch black, with candles giving a little illumination. By this point, the beer section had been heavily raided, and I found a six-pack of New Amsterdam and one of Guinness. Both require a bottle opener, which I didn't have (but I later improvised with a staple remover!)
They charged about $2.50 per beer, but it was worth it. I went back to work, drank 3 beers, and decided to hit the road, after removing my dress shirt and tie. White t-shirt it was!
At 7 p.m., with one six-pack and the staple remover, I hit the closest bar, Connelly's, which was serving as fast as the bartenders could pour or hand out beers. Normal prices. People were spilled out into the street, drinking and smoking heavily.
Mostly for the pint glass, I bought a beer and continued up 47th Street, turning up 5th Avenue. It was amazing, a truly rare experience, openly drinking glasses of beer while walking along 5th, not a care in the world. Some people gave me the thumbs up, but most just didn't care.

7:30 p.m.
Part 2 - Traffic Direction
At 57th and 5th, there was very heavy traffic moving eastward, toward the 59th Street Bridge into Queens. If left unregulated, it would have gridlocked 5th Avenue and effectively blocked off 5th Avenue, which would have affected traffic all the way up Central Park East. When I got to the intersection, about 6 people, apparently strangers to each other, were directing traffic. They were all young: white, black, Asian, male, female, some with tattoos. They had found a couple of those square orange roadside flags, and the cars were obeying them. I drank a couple more beers, watching the flow, and then finally relieved one of the guys for about a half hour (I had to, and he needed a break - I even gave him one of my beers!). My job was to stop four lanes of traffic flying down Fifth Avenue with nothing but me and my orange flag, my arms out from my sides. Every last car (and bus and motorcycle and limo and truck) stopped.
The traffic moving east on 57th was very slow, and only a couple of cars could make it across 5th at a time. Once 57th was full, the cross-town people would shoo the remaining pedestrians and then shout "Downtown, downtown!" Upon hearing the cry, I would wave my orange flag like I was starting a race and the cars would race south again.
Lots of fun. People were thanking us and no one honked.
After about 30 minutes, it got truly dark. The guy I had relieved had come back with some orange ConEd vests, and was waiting to jump back into the game. I also realized that after drinking 8 or 9 beers, standing in 4 lanes of traffic in pitch darkness was maybe not the best idea. I gave the guy his flag back, and headed north, toward Yogi's.

8:30 p.m.
Part 3 - Bar Scene
I walked along 59th Street and then north on Broadway to 76th Street, where my 'local' bar, Yogi's, is. City buses were still moving, and they looked like trains in India, except with no one actually on top of the bus. You could not have fit another person into those things. At the same time, garbage trucks were picking up garbage! The city still functioned. Many bars were open, lit by candles, and at Yogi's, they were pouring, it was pretty full, and people were trying to sing the country songs that normally played on the jukebox. (Again, normal beer prices)
We talked a guy with an acoustic guitar into coming in a playing and we collected some cash for him. The bartender was working a double shift, as her 8 p.m. replacement never showed, so she was a bit cranky. My friend the detective was bouncing, and it was almost like a normal night. Tom, the owner, showed up at one point, but the bar kept going. My German friends couldn't fly out that night, as planned, so they came to the bar to meet me.
I wound up making a new friend, who lived on 68th and Amsterdam.
Walking through the street, the only lights were candles in apartment windows, and when I finally made it home at 4:30 a.m., even these were mostly out. Pitch black.
The weird part about walking up Broadway in the blackout was that there were people outside everywhere: you just wouldn't see them until you were 10 feet away! They were sleeping, or hanging out, or whatever.
At home, a building maintenance guy had to walk me up the 9 flights of stairs to light my way with a flashlight (it was policy). My hallway was pitch black, so it was navigate by feel, using my cellphone to confirm that my door was indeed my door.

Friday, 9:30 a.m.
I woke up and we had power (since 5:20 a.m.) so I walked to work (no subways). I had assumed the whole City had power, but we were still on generator in midtown. I worked about 4 hours, and then we all decided to leave, as the office was mostly empty.
The Germans flew out Friday afternoon. They had found some candles in my apartment and had opened a couple bottles of wine.

And that was my blackout! All in all, I had a great time!

- posted by Christoph Roggenkamp @ 8/18/2003 05:20:00 PM