Newspapers abroad also focused on the looting. But the power outage is not the only darkness the episode is all about. }) All at exactly 8:28 p.m. on the 13th of July 1977, striking from a line of sodden black thunderclouds rolling across northern Westchester County. Businesses felt the fallout from the looting, which caused even more white flight. It started on July 13 . Let us help. The following photos show what happened during and after the blackout of 1977. "[7], In all, 1,616 stores were damaged in looting and rioting. Switchboard operators at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel, like much of the city, worked by candlelight. Suspected looters are chained together after being arrested. ga('ads.send', { let gads_event; 3 (also known as "Big Allis"), shut down and with it went all of New York City. Yankees manager Billy Martin, and the team's strutting superstar, Reggie Jackson, nearly come to blows. Cops contain suspected looters at Grand Concourse and Fordham Road in the Bronx during blackout. The blackout ultimately shone a spotlight on some of the citys long-overlooked shortcomings, from glaring flaws in the power network to the much deeper-rooted issues of racial inequality and the suffering of the American underclass, as TIME dubbed it. My report would. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Enjoying our content? The 1977 looters continued their activities into the daylight hours, with police on alert. In one of those bizarre coincidences thats almost too strange to be true, the blackout that affected a large swath of Midtown Manhattan on Saturday happened on the 42nd anniversary of the massive citywide power outage of 1977. 1. MEAWW is an initialism for Media Entertainment Arts WorldWide. Most of the thefts occurred in Brooklyn Crown Heights, Bushwick, Bedford-Stuyvesant as raging crowds savaged stores. This magical night ended with the thin crescent Moon, Jupiter, Venus, Mars and the orange star Aldebaran all lined up in the eastern sky at dawn, followed by a beautiful sunrise. It became a. The citizens of the Big Apple lived in sheer terror during the sweltering summer of 1977. As Russia's failures mount in its war against Ukraine, can Biden prevent an isolated Putin from doing the unthinkable? [4] Per procedure, Consolidated Edison, the power provider for New York City and some of Westchester County, tried to bring a fast-start generating station online at 8:45p.m. EDT; however, no one was manning the station, and the remote start failed. I love creating & composing history articles and lists. A couple of years prior, in 1975, the city had turned to the federal government for a bailout. 1977: Lightning strikes a Consolidated Edison substation along the Hudson River, tripping two circuit breakers and setting off a chain of events that results in a massive power failure. A congressional study estimated that the cost of damages amounted to a little over $300million (equivalent to $1.47 billion in 2022). Some people eating in restaurants made their way onto the streets when the power went out, so did the air conditioning. In the wake of the power outag. In a WIRED exclusive, the human behind the wheel finally speaks. Please attempt to sign up again. The blackout couldn't have come at a worse time for a city that was already down on its luck. ConEd called the shutdown an "act of God," enraging Mayor Beame, who charged that the utility was guilty of "gross negligence. How many babies were born 9 months later? Many had to be stuffed into overcrowded cells, precinct basements, and other makeshift holding pens. For much of July 14, most of the television stations in New York City were off the air (as the areas where those TV stations were located were still without power for much of the day), although WCBS-TV (Channel 2) and WNBC-TV (Channel 4) did manage to stay on the air thanks to gas and diesel-fueled generators, resuming their broadcasts only 25 and 88 minutes after the blackout began, respectively. Dominick was very special. A congressional study later put the damage caused by looting and vandalism at $300 million. At first they thought the outage was local and caused by something they had done, but realized when they heard stores closing that it was citywide and took advantage of the community's vulnerability to steal a mixing board from a local business. Police officers and passersby stand in front of a damaged storefront, looted in the wake of the New York City blackout. And both their parents are gone. Cover Credit: SKYLINE BY ERIC MEOLA; LOOTERS BY ALON REININGER/CONTACT. The. Looters young and old leave an A&P supermarket at Ogden Avenue and 166th Street in the Bronx through a broken window. WIRED is where tomorrow is realized. ga('ads.send', { Ciscone was the only person killed during the blackout, but not the only murder victim to die on that very corner. The Real Story of the New York City Blackout of 1977 | by Gena Vazquez | New York Voice | Medium 500 Apologies, but something went wrong on our end. The police arrested over 3,700 people involved in looting and damaging properties. But there was just one murder victim that dark night: Dominick Ciscone, 17. Rumor from way back when was it was a case of mistaken identity. As he reached out to people in Carroll Gardens, McDonough came up against the tight-lipped quality of a traditional Italian community. hitType: 'event', We'll look back at one of the defining moments in the city's psyche that began 45 years ago tonight the 1977 blackout. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Thanks for contacting us. In the summer of 1977, the NYPD discovered a handwritten letter near the bodies of Esau and Suriani, addressed to NYPD Captain Joseph Borrelli. ga('ads.send', { It was caused by stress on the system after a series of lightning storms in Westchester County, but human and mechanical error, per the New York Times, exacerbated the issue. At 8:55p.m., there was another lightning strike at the Sprain Brook substation in Yonkers, which took out two additional critical transmission lines. [10] The Yankees were on the road at Milwaukee; less than a week later, Yankee Stadium hosted the All-Star Game on Tuesday, July 19. In late 1977, The Trammps released the song "The Night the Lights Went Out" to commemorate the electrical blackout. In all, 1,616 stores were damaged in looting and rioting. Back in the 1970s, the area was pure Italian, imbued with family, food and traditions. People gather around the site of a car crash in the dark. } [4] A loose locking nut combined with a slow-acting upgrade cycle prevented the breaker from reclosing and allowing power to flow again. Thirty-five blocks of Broadway were destroyed: 134 stores looted, 45 of them also set ablaze. An economic decline, coupled with rising crime rates and the panic-provoking (and paranoia-inducing) Son of Sam murders, had combined to make the late 1970s New Yorks Dark Ages. Her oldest brother, Joe, passed in 1984. In fact, the looting of music stores during the blackout enabled people who couldnt afford turntables and mixers to gather the equipment they needed to become DJs. window.googletag.pubads().addEventListener('slotOnload', function(event) { The breakthroughs and innovations that we uncover lead to new ways of thinking, new connections, and new industries. I noticed lights going out from south to north, when we were suddenly in the dark. atmosphere of 1965. Despite the looting, some New Yorkers took to the streets to help direct traffic. She always wanted them to catch the person. Possibly the hardest hit were Crown Heights, where 75 stores on a five-block stretch were looted, and Bushwick, where arson was rampant, with some 25 fires still burning the next morning. . Pedestrians used their cellphones as flashlights to cross the streets, Broadway shows were disrupted and commuters scrambled to find alternative ways home after subway stations were shuttered. A blackout in 1977 left New York City without power for 25 hours. The area, which had been home to mob enforcer Crazy Joey Gallo, was a tight-knit world unto itself, where everyone knew each other and outsiders werent welcome. It gave him a cut across the side of his head, right above his eyebrow.. He wasnt against practicing his skills on anyone stupid enough to harass the local girls or cross over from the Red Hook projects to hang out on his turf. Magazines, Or create a free account to access more articles, Why the 1977 Blackout Was One of New Yorks Darkest Hours. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), By 1:45p.m., service was restored to half of Con Edison's customers, mostly in Staten Island and Queens. The 1977 blackout also caused widespread transportation disruption, including at Grand Central Terminal. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), Still, on the 40th anniversary of Doms death, local police have once again heated up efforts to solve this cold case. Looting during the 1977 New York City blackout unleashed calls for tough-on-crime policies. That blackout began around 9:30 p.m. on July 13, 1977, and power wasnt restored for 25 hours. On the night of Wednesday, July 13th, 1977, the power went out in all of New York City and parts of Westchester County, leaving eight million people in the dark. },false) Power was slowly restored over the next day, with the entire city online by 10:39 p.m. A breakdown of impact areas shows that indirect impacts account for over $290 million, which led the DOE to conclude that indirect as well as direct impacts must be incorporated in the cost of power outages. About 4,000 people had to be evacuated from the subways. 8:37 PM Lightning strike at Buchanan South, a substation on the Hudson River, trips two circuit breakers in Westchester County. This Time magazine cover for the week of July 25, 1977, shows the chaos that erupted in the streets of New York during the blackout on July 13 to 14 in 1977. On Saturday, many people finished their meals by the lights of their cellphones, an option not available in 1977. A police officer arrests a suspected looter. "New York blackout" redirects here. The Best Password Managers to Secure Your Digital Life. The nation as a whole, especially New York City, was suffering from a protracted economic downturn, and commentators have contrasted the event with the good-natured "Where Were You When the Lights Went Out?" Saturdays blackout caused problems along the entire subway system, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. The operating entities in New York fully investigated the blackout, its related causes, and the operator actions. }); Despite the prevalent mood of panic, many did spring into action, helping neighbors in need, directing traffic, and trying to keep the peace. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), Very respectful of his elders. Movie-star handsome, Dom played the part of a scuffling guardian, offering the charm of Tony Danza and the hard right of Charles Bronson. He was a tough kid hanging out with his brother Andrew and their friends on a corner in Carroll Gardens in Brooklyn, an old-school Italian neighborhood with a wiseguy contingent. eventCategory: event.slot.getSlotElementId(), Police investigated several people with whom he had ongoing disputes, but never identified any suspects. eventAction: 'render' At 9:24p.m., the ConEdison operator tried and failed to manually shed load by dropping customers. In all, 1,616 stores were either looted or damaged during the blackout. The Long Island operators did not notice the drop in 115kV cable loadings and went ahead with opening their 345kV tie to New York City. Check here if you would like to receive subscription offers and other promotions via email from TIME group companies. The lights went out, elevators stalled, and subways ground to a . More than a thousand fires were set, 14 of them resulting in multiple alarms. We've received your submission. During the now-notorious 25-hour blackout, which affected all five boroughs, some 1,000 fires were set and 1,600 stores looted. And there was a thick darkness in all the land. Hey Friend, Before You Go.. Police officers and passersby stand in front of a looted store in Brooklyn. Par Three was the popular watering hole. There were also some familiar scenes. New Yorks Shea Stadium lies in darkness during the bottom of the sixth inning after the lights went out during the game with the Chicago Cubs, July 13, 1977. A DOE report has concluded that the 1977 blackout in New York City cost $350 million, with at least half this cost due to looting and arson. She relived it over and over, said Mildred. 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[11] Although much of New York City was still without power, Belmont Park (a racetrack on the border of Queens and Nassau County in Elmont) did stage their scheduled racing program that afternoon in front of a relatively sparse crowd, as many thought racing would be cancelled that day due to the blackout. A group of people hold a party on a SoHo sidewalk. A congressional study estimated that the cost of damages amounted to a little over $300 million (equivalent to $1.2 billion in 2017). Five minutes later, at 9:29p.m., the Goethals-Linden 230kV interconnection with New Jersey tripped, and the Con Edison system automatically began to isolate itself from the outside world through the action of protective devices that remove overloaded lines, transformers, and cables from service. 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