New York Governor Kathy Hochul said on Saturday, as the city started to dry up after one of its wettest days ever that the torrential downpours that caused flash flooding in New York City on Friday reflect a “new normal” as a result of the effects of climate change.
A sea lion at the Central Park Zoo was able to briefly escape the constraints of her pool enclosure thanks to the over eight inches (20 cm) of rain that fell in certain areas of the country’s most populous city.
A municipal hospital in the Brooklyn borough announced it would evacuate all patients and personnel after a power outage on Friday, despite the fact that the city’s risk of flooding had subsided by midday on Saturday.
After the neighborhood outage on Friday, NYC Health + Hospitals/Woodhull shifted to backup power, but repairs would necessitate a complete power loss for a number of days, according to hospital officials. On Saturday, the clinic was sending its 120 patients—a procedure that should take eight hours—to other hospitals.
A few streets became rivers as a result of the heavy rain, which also caused certain subway and commuter rail lines to be shut down and left buses and cars stranded for hours. At LaGuardia Airport, one terminal was evacuated, and flights were delayed or cancelled.
Hochul remarked, “Unfortunately, this is the new normal that we must prepare for.
The following six days will see the continuation of a state of emergency, which enables quicker allocation of resources to address a crisis. There were no storm-related deaths reported.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency was ready to help if necessary, according to the White House, and President Joe Biden was briefed on the flooding on Friday and Saturday.
