8/14/03 DAY OF THE BLACKOUT OF 2003:







This should have been a normal day, and it started out that way. I had editing to do, and while the computers worked, I headed out to the local Greenmarket to get some stuff. I've been going to the greenmarket to look around for some time, but I have not yet bought anything. I just go to look, to sort of build trust between me and these odd farmers from the country. So today I went with the intention of finally buying.



I smelled the cantaloupe, as Richard taught me, and they smelled amazingly ripe compared to any I smelled at Zeytuna. So I got one for $3.




A view of the Greenmarket.




When I got home, this is what I had bought. A jar of raspberry jam, a raspberry humentachen, coconut macaroons, and the cantaloupe.




On my way upstairs, I stopped by the Valet in the lobby and picked up a bunch of my shirts. Circle Line uniforms.




I went back to my computer, and was actually working on this website, waiting for the computer to export a school play to tape. DVD's were simultaneously burning. All of a sudden the screen flickers out. So do all of the lights, and all of the whirring noises in the room came to a halt. Then I heard strange clicking noises coming from Richard's computer behind me. It sounded like Richard's computer's hard drives (he has external ones) were going crazy. So, I figured we were having power surges, following a blackout, and I ran to the fuse box to throw all of our circuit breaker switches to the off position. That stopped the clicking noises. My next thought was to get out of the building, because when the power goes out in New York City, it's usually bad news. It could have been a large terrorist event going on out of sight from my window, and I wanted to be outside as soon as possible. Before I left, I grabbed only one thing: My camera. Thus, the photos that follow.

I opened the door to my apartment, and was greeted with pitch black where the hallway would have been. A bit miffed that we have no emergency lights in our hallways, I used the flashlight I have on my keychain to find the stairwell. Once there, most of the emergency lights were working, and I walked (ran) down the 10 flights to the lobby, encountering only one person on the way. I was way ahead of everyone else. In the lobby, all hell was breaking loose. Everything was beeping and flashing. I went outside.

I looked down the block, and saw that all of the streetlights were not working in every direction, as far as I could see. This was more disturbing. I decided to walk to the water. An instinct I developed post-September 11th, as we escaped from Manhattan by ferry to New Jersey that day. Everything on the street was slowly becoming more and more like September 11th, which did not please me at all.




For example, on my way to the Hudson River, I passed this cluster of workers who were all scratching their heads outside the World Financial Center building. Normalcy was quickly breaking down. I also noticed a major difference between what was occurring on the streets today, and what occurred on the streets on September 11th... although a similar number of people were holding their cell phones to their faces, none of them, today, were talking on them. In other words, as I quickly realized, nobody was able to make any calls. AT ALL. On September 11th the occasional call would get through. I had been trying my own (calling my mother) to no avail, and quickly figured out that the cell phone towers are all based on electricity. And so, I now knew that this problem was not just in Downtown Manhattan. I began to wonder about midtown and the greater city of New York.



Many other people were heading to the Ferry. I decided that I would head up to Circle Line to help out in the case that they began to do Ferry service to New Jersey, as they had done on September 11th. I tried to use New York Water Taxi, but they were on their commuter schedule, which does not include a stop next to Circle Line. So, I followed everybody else to New York Waterway, with the plan of taking a boat to Weehawken, to catch another boat back to 38th street, right next to Circle Line.



Crossing West Street was a bit of a challenge without the help of traffic lights. So, I stopped cars, and crossed. Sometimes you just need to be aggressive.




More people heading to the temporary ferry terminal just north of the World Financial Center, in front of Rockefeller Park in Battery Park City.




I just made it onto the ferry terminal. Right after I got there, the line backed out of the terminal into Battery Park City. I found the boat to Weehawken, which, luckily, most people were not interested in. Almost everybody there seemed to want to go to Hoboken South, or Colgate. It was here that I was first informed that the blackout extended to New Jersey, and a few people were mentioning that it had reached Cleveland and Toronto. This was getting spooky. But I was determined to get to Circle Line. I didn't buy a ticket, and I plowed onto the boat, proclaiming that it was an emergency, and that I was needed at my post at Circle Line. Nobody gave me a hard time about it.




The ferry was very pleasant, aside from the blackout. The gentleman in the foreground in the above photo said that he had never taken the ferry before, even though he worked in the Financial District and lived within walking distance of Hoboken North. He said that he would definitely begin taking it, as he very much enjoyed the trip over driving. The woman sitting next to him, on the right, was a die-hard ferry-taker, and she said that she hasn't taken the subway since before the last blackout in 1977. So, as you can see, the range of opinions here run the gamut. I spoke with all the people around me, a similar breakdown of social barriers as occurred on September 11th. We were all in this together. Interestingly enough, nobody was panicked, in fact, many people seemed to relieved about hearing that it was probably not a terrorist attack, that they forgot to be upset about the blackout.




Getting off the boat at Weehawken. This guy is on his cell, but he aint talking. Nobody could get through.




So then, once again in the name of Circle Line and Emergency, I boarded a second ferry, with about 9 other people, bound for Manhattan. When we pulled up to the 38th street terminal, we saw a wall of people waiting to get on the ferry, back to New Jersey. It seemed as if we would never get through.




This was quite an intimidating sight. The idea of crowd control, to leave a path for us to exit the terminal, had apparently gone out the window.




More people, as we wormed out way through. I was calling out "Make way!" And "Let us through!" And "There are people trying to exit here people! Even though we're going the wrong way!" Many people laughed. Some people seemed too miffed to enjoy the humor.




It took about 10 minute to move about 200 feet.




When I got to the bike path, just before I hit West Street, I saw that the wall of people extended north for many, many blocks. As far as the eye could see.




The police had closed down West Street, and people were walking down the bike path. The very path I had planned to bike on with Brian this very afternoon. He had called my cell phone from his office a few minute after the blackout, and actually got through. I told him to call my mother and let her know I was not stuck in an elevator or a subway train, and I gave him her cell number. I was glad that at least one person knew I was o.k.




As I walked the few blocks towards the Circle Line pier, I saw even more people walking south to line up for the ferries. I knew that we would inevitably need to start ferrying people ourselves. Circle Line has nice big boats that carry over 500 people each. New York Waterway has many more boats, but they carry about 150 each, and it would take hours to evacuate all those people.




While I was on the ferry bound for 38th street, I saw, to my amazement, that Circle Line had sent out another tour-guided boat. This was half an hour after the blackout had begun. When I showed up, another Tour-Guide boat was arriving at the end of its 3-hour tour. The people had been told that the city they left was not the city they were arriving at. I showed up and started asking if we were going to begin a ferry service to Jersey. The management was just showing up to make that decision.




Meanwhile, a line, was beginning to form in front of our terminal even though nobody had said we would be going anywhere. This is probably because of September 11th. New Yorkers actually have an evacuate-NYC routine!




The guy on the left pointing to the right is the President of Circle Line. He decided that we would do the ferry service, and that we would charge $5 a head. This was when he was giving instructions on how it would all happen. The first thing to do was to find a place to dock the boats in the Jersey side, as that is not normally what we do. They couldn't communicate with Jersey because of the blackout, so they send "the Beast," the speedboat attraction at Circle Line was sent quickly ahead to work it out with Lincoln Harbor in Weehawken. It took a bout an hour to get organized into New York's newest Ferry to New Jersey.




Deckhands and crew get the gangway ready on Boat 12, before the gate in the background is lifted to let in the refugees.




The coast guard then showed up. The collected the members of the staff, and asked if anybody had become rowdy or disorderly. We said no. They had us explain what we intended to do. They agreed that it was the best coarse of action, and they boarded Boat 12 for the first journey to Jersey.



We were about ready to begin loading the first boat around 5pm. A woman was brought forward who was fainting from the combination of the heat and the tension. so they brought her aboard first and sat her down.




It took about a half hour to load the first boat. The factor most slowing the process down was the collection of $5 cash from each person. I was pretty pissed off about it. I considered it an emergency, and I considered it our mandate to help these people get home. The management felt otherwise. I was also worried about public backlash, and yes, we did have a few people who were vocally upset about the $5, especially those who had been on Circle Line on September 11th for free. But... many more people were vocally gracious, even after paying, and some even gave us more then $5. So, I was quite surprised about that. And it softened up my opinion on the matter by the end of the day. People appreciated that we are not a ferry company, and that it was only a quasi-emergency, and that we were providing a service, albeit impromptu, for a reasonable fee. I still feel 50/50.




The crew of the "12" as it left. I ran to the next boat, the "16" to see if I could help out. It turned out that John Mason, tour guide on the "16" for the day, had left the pier right before the blackout. So the "16" didn't have a guide. So, I asked if I could take the microphone and they said yes. So, as Heidi Handelsman put it a few days later, "I got to play the Hero." I got to take the microphone and be the calming, informative, and a little entertaining voice on their anxious 7-minute trip across the Hudson. I came up with a few good one liners, like "I'm sure you'll all be sad to hear that the HarborLIGHTS tour has been cancelled this evening." And, "You may count yourselves among the very few people in the 50 year history of Circle Line who have ever taken the Circle Line NOT in a Circle."




As we pulled up to Lincoln Harbor in Weehawken, the boat in front of us passed as it headed back to Manhattan.




We packed the boat to its capacity. I told people that we had bathrooms and that the snack bar was open. I told them the little I knew about the extent of the blackout, and that the trip to Weehawken would be 7 minutes. I apologized for not being in my uniform, and told them that I had come in on a day off. I invited them to ask me further questions, and told them, "I'm the guy with the microphone." And then I left them alone until we got out to Jersey.




We unloaded people in Weehawken, knowing nothing about the transportation available to them there. So, I wished them "good luck," which usually got another laugh from my brief audience. I thanked them for taking the "7 minute" tour, and told them to come back for the "3 hour" one, on a regular day.




It took about 15 minutes just to unload the boat.




Once we left, another boat was waiting to pull in. The sun began to set, and now, I had my first thought about what I was going to do in Manhattan once it got dark. I repeatedly tried calling my mother, my brother, my father, and Brian, who I knew was also in the city. [I knew Richard was stranded in Westchester, and contacting him would help neither of us.] I also tried Louie, Erin, Aaron, and Mike. No calls were getting out at all. But, what was even more infuriating, is that I was still able to get the occasional message that I had 6 or 7 or 8 voicemail piling up, and I could not get my voicemail either. I was cursing out Voicestream (T-mobile).




Heading back to Manhattan, the sun is reflecting off the new twin towers of the AOL-Time Warner building going up at Columbus Circle. I figured that I would stay at my post until we were done, and then I would go to the village to try and find Brian at his place.




There were still plenty of people waiting to get to Jersey, so we made a second trip. Three other boats were also going back and forth.




And here, towards the end of sunset, is when the enormity of the blackout really began to become evident, even from the water. Here is the skyline, dark, against the young night sky.




I was absolutely amazed by this sight. I knew it happened every so often, and I was always fascinated by the stories that my parents have told me about their experiences in New York City in the blackouts of the 60's and 70's. But to see it in person... no lights on the Empire State... it was one of those moments that you know you would remember forever, because it would stand out as so unique compared to all other memories. It was so quiet and calm on the Hudson. The sunset, which can get tainted by light pollution was absolutely pristine, over the darkened New Jersey. I saw greens and purples in the sky that I never thought I'd see in the Hudson, followed by more stars than I ever thought I'd see in New York City. As we got closer to shore, we could see candle light in the windows of Manhattan apartment buildings.




The captains had never docked or even maneuvered the Circle Line boats in total darkness before. They showed some apprehension. The captain of the "16," had me stand at the front of the ship to help him look out for small craft passing by in the dark. And he used this floodlight to help him find the pier.




As we pulled in, Circle Line 12 was making her 3rd trip, and we were told that we would be making a 3rd as well. Here she is, in the above photo, disembarking in the blackness.




My third group of people had been waiting on line for over 5 hours. It was now 9:45pm. They were the best audience I have ever had. I could tell from their positive reaction to the first thing out of my mouth. And so, I knew they would be good sports, and I told the folks in the back of the upper deck to smile and wave for a photo for my personal collection. And they did. With this group, unlike the others, I even got into a tiny bit of NYC trivia, because I knew they would be entertained. I asked them how many bridges connected Manhattan to other boroughs. People began calling out numbers, and I handled it like an auction. "15, the lady says 15, do I hear 16? 16?" And this went on, until they stopped, and I told them, "The answer is 20!" And they all gasped and made a fuss in their surprise. An audience of New Yorkers (and New Jerseyers). Soooo nice.

By this point the skyline of Jersey City was all lit up in the distance, as they had regained their power. When I pointed out that the Jersey City skyline was lit up while the New York skyline remained dark, the overwhelming population of Jersey residents on the boat cheered and hollered. We all had a really good time, if you can believe that. This group had been waiting on line for half a day, and they were just loopy by the evening, in spite of all the trouble, so happy to be on a boat, crossing the Hudson.




The above is a photograph of the moon rising up from behind the Manhattan Skyline... in the dark. No joke. It's there. The Empire State Building is actually in this shot. With no lights on.




When we finished our third trip the line was almost gone, and we were told to go home. A small assortment of food was available to us at World Yacht (owned by Circle Line) on one of their dinner boats. I went there, had some melon from the buffet, and began the walk downtown, repeatedly failing to make any outgoing calls.

When I hit Chelsea Piers, I got a patch of cell phone coverage, probably from Jersey, and I listened to my nine messages. Mostly from my Mother and Brian, one from Aaron, and one from Peter. But I still couldn't make any outgoing calls. I found a payphone, and I had a quarter, but no dial tone. Still completely frustrated, at about 11:15pm, I continued walking. I was determined to find Brian, so I walked down to Christopher Street.

In the photo above, these were people just hanging out in the new Hudson River Park at Christopher Street. Floodlights were set up above a generator for a little light. The atmosphere was very similar to a party.




[This is a flash photo taken in the dark of candlelight. That's why it looks like the power is back. It's not.] I got to Brian's just after Midnight. He had gone to sleep after waiting for me all afternoon and evening, about 20 minutes before I arrived. I told him I couldn't call ahead, and we sat for a while, comparing notes. Then we tried to go to Manatus, but they were closed. We went to the deli and got melting raisin bread and cream cheese, and some juice for me. We ate, drank, and then Brian set up a bed for me on his couches, and I slept with some difficulty in the sticky heat. He is lucky he lives on the first floor, something that is generally considered to be a liability was a great asset during the blackout. If I had tried to go to my place, I would have had to climb 10 stories in the pitch black.


Tomorrow will be another interesting day. Stay tuned.