Nineteen workers were trapped inside a Consolidated Edison power station on the east side of Manhattan Monday night by rising floodwaters that accompanied the surge from powerful storm Sandy, according to a Reuters witness.
A rescue worker, who declined to be named, said the station had suffered an explosion inside.
A New York camera operator filmed a transformer erupting in a huge ball of blue light in downtown Manhattan after Hurricane Sandy made landfall, according to gothamist.com. The video went viral.
See the video below:
The video shows flashes of blue lights from across the East River in Brooklyn from what appears to be a Con Ed power plant.
Earlier in the day, Con Ed announced it had shut off power to parts of Lower Manhattan so it could be restored after the storm much faster.