Slowly moved its way up north. But that is the problem for a lot of people. We are hitting the top of the hour. I should mention that the power outage in New York City has now reached well past three hours. Here at msnbc along with morgan radford, weve been watching a number of different Breaking News situations right now. The big news that were getting here as we talk to you here at 10 00 p. M. We are now told at least 90,000 customers have been affected by this massive blackout here in New York City. When we first came on air several hours ago and they said that it was only about 20,000 customers, i knew that number was wrong, just based on the sheer topography. You have more than two square miles in New York City where people are in the dark. Now were being told by con edison officials that 90,000 customers which could mean hundreds of thousands of people
are in the dark right now at 10 00 at night. Just to do a quick reset for anyone who is joining us now. What we are facing out is
As we reach the top of the hour, the mayor of new york, bill de blas blasio, is tweeting about all of this and mentioning the Fire Department and the city agencies are responding and trying to get this power outage fixed here in new york city. It was all due to a manhole fire that took place earlier this evening. The disruption is significant. And we do say good afternoon and good evening, everybody, if youre tuning in at 9 00 p. M. Eastern. 6 00 p. M. On the west coast. A massive power outage that has taken place about 6 45 p. M. Thousands of people are without power. Weve been watching new yorks times square where you can see to the left of the scene. Many buildings are without power. They have not been restored of yet. Con ed is telling us that full power will be restored by 10 30
p. M. Eastern. The other big story is Tropical Storm barry. It is moving at eight miles an hour, slowly making its way me andiering through new orleans. It is Dumping Rain On Ruining Rouge Biffle the time
to help with traffic and safety issues. i just ran here and there s chaos. there are cars stopped on 7th and 8th avenue. but the national guard can help the traffic floes within the city and any additional vehicular traffic trying to exit manhattan island, because perhaps other forms of transportation are down. the immediate issue, however, ana, is much more serious. because of the power outage, there s an immediate need to stabilize high-risk individuals. that could be hospitals, the elderly, people without air-conditioning. and that s the immediate first step that i imagine first responders are looking into while dealing with the secondary issue of trying to get people around the city and out of the city as necessary. imagine when you talk about to hospital and people who are vulnerable. we spoke with new york city council speaker here, and he did mention one of the hospitals that he knew of that was already running on backup generators. and he said they didn t have air-conditionin
mentioned, this moment where something like a blackout can bring a community together. i ll tell you something else that can bring a community together is a j.lo concert and there was one that was planned here in new york city. jenny from the block. the 6 train is working. the acd and a whole lot of lines, the one, two, and three. here s a clip from what took place moments ago at the jennifer lopez concert at madison square garden. we will try to roll it. please leave the building. please go to the nearest exit. please proceed calmly and quietly while exiting the building. thank you for your cooperation. please do it orderly. thank you. can you imagine i cannot. that looks like pandemonium. they evacuated madison square garden moments before jennifer lopez was about to hitd the
lemonade out of lemons. i think that we were talking earlier about how every person who lives in this city, especially since 9/11 when something like this happens our stomach initially drops. it s just the reality of the changed dna of the city and of our nation and this heightened security. but we re lucky that this was a blackout, it was a mechanical issue. so we saw new yorkers coming froth all over the city just like this concert hall and just like people who were jumping in to direct traffic. and in contrast to that, the j.lo concert was canceled. and we have video of people out there getting together singing ain t your mama. a j.lo song. people were just frustrated at the j.lo concert. let s bring in kathy park. you as an nbc correspondent here on msnbc news. you have been outside of our studio where it has been pitch