Sandy continues to batter the US East Coast. A quarter of the New York subway system has been flooded. A frightening picture appeared on Twitter, which showed a shark swimming in a flooded street in a residential area of the city. The super storm has claimed at least 14 lives. The damage from the storm to the U.S. economy may reach $10-20 billion, says RBC.
'The New York City subway system is 108 years old, but it has never faced a disaster as devastating as what we experienced last night,' said Joseph Lhota, chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA).
'Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on our entire transportation system, in every borough and county of the region. It has brought down trees, ripped out power and inundated tunnels, rail yards and bus depots,' he said.
The tunnels of seven lines of the New York subway have been flooded.
The hurricane, according to the latest data, has killed 14 people in the states of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and West Virginia, as well as in Canada's Toronto. A few more people have been hospitalized. In total, the disaster in the Caribbean basin and North America, has killed as many as 70 people.
The rise of the water level in the ocean poses a threat to Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in the state of New Jersey. If the water level continues to rise, it can damage the pumps, which allow water to cool spent nuclear fuel, BBCRussian.com said.
An explosion occurred at an electrical substation in New York, which is in the epicenter of the hurricane. More than 5.5 million Americans have been left without electricity.