in parts of the city tonight. tens of thousands of people now without power in the big apple. mostly in the midtown part of the city, the famous electric billboards in times square, many of them are in the dark. restaurants, theaters, stores, apartment buildings, without electricity. con edison is the power company here in new york city. they say they're working to restore service, for now, much of manhattan on a hot saturday night in july is in the dark. and cnn's brian stelter joins us by the phone. i know you are steps from central park, what does new york city look like tonight from your vantage point? >> the crossing guards are running the intersections, they have their flashlights out directing traffic. carnegie hall is nearby. some of the performers weren't able to put on their show, so they came out to the street and put on a show for tourists.

had is the heart of tourists of new york city. a lot of the tourists are amused by this, a lot of the residents like myself and family are annoyed. hopefully this is nothing more than a nuisance, some elderly residents for some people who need to get up and down, elevators, this has been a problem, we know the police and fire responded to dozens of calls about elevator outages. i'm looking out at the nearby buildings. i see, first of all, the moon starting to light up new york city. second, some neighbors bringing out canned ems, finding ways to create light. in some office buildings, you see some of the expensive buildings turning on their backup generators. for the most part, the city of new york, midtown west from fifth avenue over to the hudson river is in the dark. the 70s, over to 72nd street. you see people walking out with

their cell phones, using them as flashlights. at least for a few hours, people will have that as a backup source of power. >> when you're talking to people around there, people worried, are they concerned, what is the mind-set? >> i think it's mostly intrigue, but a little bit of concern. i spoke with my neighbors, i live in a high rise building here in columbus circle. they had to walk 15 flights up the stairs with the dog. that's no more than an annoyance. certainly my wife who is 8 months pregnant the is concerned about having to go to the hospital. certainly we can walk over. the tourists who don't know how to get around. the broadway shows have been cancelled. people who had plans on a saturday night in new york city,

are seeing plans get screwed up. we're seeing people direct traffic, therein weren't enough crossing guards right away to do so. we see residents step up to the challenge. >> let me read the latest update we had from con edison, this is from a little while ago. the latest we have right now is that con edison is responding to extensive power outages affecting approximately 42,000 customers on the west side of manhattan, the company will provide updates as they become available. company crews are working now to repair the problem. con edison advises in the affected areas, for people to switch off or unplug electrical appliances, to avoid potential damage to those appliances when power is restored, that's important information for those who may be listening to us right now on the radio devices. i want to bring chad myers in to give us more information about

the scope of these power outages, chad? >> really from 72, 72nd street upper west side, all the way down to 42, 42nd, somewhere in between, i heard some power on on 51st street, all the way from the hudson river over to about avenue of the americas or sixth avenue, a fairly small tight little area here. but a very touristy area. the most touristy area in the city of new york, right through here. central park through here, all the way down through lower manhattan. battery park, power is completely on there. it's the area up near the park that is the most affected. let's zoom in and we'll drill down on this, to show you the people that are out of power. i think brian hit it really on the head. sure, 40,000 customers are without power, what does that mean if there's only one meter to a building, all of a sudden

there are many more people on that one meter, con ed only believes -- it's only saying there's one customer affected. clearly there are more than 42,000 people living in this area. with the elevators in the high rises and hotels, there will be a lot of people inconvenienced here, here are the outages here, here's central park. this would be broadway all the way down to times square. and if we zoom in, we can show you how many buildings are here. how many high rises are in the area, and how many people are truly affected. many businesses probably don't count. and there are a lot of office spaces in here, and because it's a saturday night, hopefully nobody's there working. that's the good news here, all the elevators that did get stopped if they weren't on emergency power, those people are being taken off slowly i assume. because they have to get from one elevator to the next. there have been many elevators in the high rise part of midtown

manhattan. >> that is a big concern, all of us can imagine being in one of those elevators when the power goes out, and how scary that would be. chad myers thank you for that update. shimon prokupecz is with us. i know you've been in touch with officials from nypd and the fire department here, what are you learning? >> the most important is for people to know that everything is under control. the nypd, the fire department, obviously responding to different calls, people needing rescue, are stuck in elevatoele they may not be able to get to everyone. unfortunately, we're over 2 hours into this, and there are many people stuck in elevators. that's just going to happen. one of the biggest issues, i think, is actually crowd control. a lot of people on the streets of manhattan in times square. tourists, people who can't get back into their homes, and others are just walking around and noticing, and watching what's going on. the biggest issue for them right now is trying to control the

crowds, the people, that have gathered all around these areas, specifically in times square. on the west side of manhattan. that's what they're dealing with, and the cars, because a lot of the traffic lights are out. so far, no injuries have been reported, no one's been seriously injured, there are people being taken to hospitals. people who live in high rise buildings, that are on oxygen. the fire department and the nypd has responded to those apartments to make sure that people who are in need of oxygen are getting oxygen. and if they need to, they're taking them to hospitals. and also, the city's office of emergency management obviously is coordinating the entire effort. and as of right now, people that i've talked to, everything seems to be under control. they seem to have a handle on it, and they're waiting for con edison to restore some of the power. after the subway system, even once power is restored, it's going to take some time to get the subways running normal,

normal again. they're going to have to run these trains through, make sure there are no issues, right now, for the most part, people are safe, i think most people are out and about, noticing what's going on, kind of want to mingle. you know, new york is an interesting place, people get out and they start helping each other. people are at corners helping traffic, and stoplights, acting as crossing guards in some way, so it's definitely an interesting time and it's definitely something that the nypd has done before. the fire department has done before, there were other major blackouts like this, in new york city. they're dealing with all this this, i think most people, what's important to know is things are under control, it's a huge inconvenience and obviously hopefully here soon the power will be restored. >> okay, thank you. stand by with us, you mentioned the subway, just want to read the latest update for the transit authority. it says there are limited service on the numbered lines. the 1, 2, 3 on the west side.

also, the 7 between manhattan and queens, however, they say our entire system is affected by this con edison outage. in manhattan, the bus is your best bet. stay tuned that is the latest, we spoke with mayor de blasio, who said they didn't believe anyone was still trapped on the subway, that was good news, as shimon just mentioned, police and fire are mobilizing to do some crowd control, they believe they have everything under control at the moment. let me bring in cnn's law enfitnessment analyst and former fbi ssi josh campbell. your reaction to what shimon just reported. >> a massive effort nunned way from emergency services. we heard there were people possibly trapped in elevators. there are a number of intersections that required traffic control. nypd spokesman tell us the nypd

strategic response group is being deployed to this area. this is their augment team, those assets are on the way. we heard this is possibly accidental. reports of a manhole fire. we're not out of the woods yet, as we look at the prolonged nature of this, we're going on now almost two hours, and we're seeing these power outages, the electric grid system is bised on redundancies, the reason it's rare you have a single point of failure. does that kuralt time? power surges, faulty equipment. system overloads and the like, the reason we don't experience them is because you have redundancy. however a prolonged incident means one of two things, either the system has been stressed to the max and the possible damage is so extreme, or authorities

haven't been able to pinpoint its location of the point failure, none of those are good, as this goes on, it will be so important for authorities to continue to communicate to the public what's going on, obviously it will be difficult for those who are impacted to turn on the television and the like, but people have mobil phones, they have the cnn app, for example, it's going to be so important for authorities to continue to communicate that information, to manage expectations, to try to ensure the situation is being handled d correctly. >> the mayor had been in touch with authorities, they could not give us a time frame in terms of how long they anticipated this would be a problem, that the outage would be on going. he did say, however, they do not believe. what i want to make sure, it's something within the normal electric grid, no other kind of external influence here, this appears to be something that just went wrong in the way they

transmit power to address the demand. he doesn't believe anything nefarious, or it was a kind of foul play involved. although he said it is still early in the investigation. let me go back to paolo sandoval on the streets of new york for us. you've been talking to tourists, what are you hearing? how are they reacting now? >> first, let me give you a sense of where we are, we're here in midtown manhattan, about 3 or 4 blocks south, you're going to end up in times square. you would run into central park. you're looking down 7th avenue and west 51st street, it's incredible when you see how dark it is, we're standing on the perimeter line of the affected area and the places that aren't affected, a gift shop, just a few feet away from me is all lit up. you see the gift shop across the street is completely in the dark, we've been hearing from touri tourists, they are heart broken, many of them are going to get to

see the show, really, as we're fairly recent new yorkers here, you and i, we've lived here long enough to say, it's hard to impress a new yorker. when you hear from those who are from here, as you see here, a lifelong resident of new york, what's your reaction, and what's happening on the streets of your city right now? >> well, i'm at work, because i work at the sheraton times square hotel. when this happened, i was at my desk with all my co-workers, all of a sudden the lights went out. we didn't know what we were doing. we talked to the guests and made sure they're okay. all my co-workers, everyone from the sheraton new york times square is taking care of the guests as best we can. this is what we do, we take care of the tourists. >> how about some of the guests on the higher levels. were there any efforts to get them down safely? >> we did everything properly, we made sure we dispatched everyone out and got everyone out safely. >> ultimate hospitality for you.

>> all day. >> this is a quick dinner break for you. did you have a hard time finding any restaurants that are actually open? >> well, from what i was told, from 72nd street coming up this way was a transformer, we didn't know where the transformer was blowing out. we kept getting calls from airlines and stuff. what we do, we do best. we make sure everything is taken care of. >> for people seeing around the world, just so they understand the significance of what we're looking at here, new yorkers, this is something that is extremely rare to see. >> we always do good under pressure, we're good with this, we've been through enough, so we know how to deal with pressure, and this is what we trained for, when we work at hotels, every day of our life. >> thank you for taking the time, and shifting into rescue mode. i'll let you have your delicious dinner. >> thank you. >> thank you for your time. >> you do get those stories, spirits are certainly high, there is some laughter, smiles,

there's also concern, right? there are people that are wondering how they're going to be able to make it home. i live in brooklyn, that's a big question. either with the traffic or the subway lines, how will some of the people actually move? there are some subway lines that we hear that are operating. some of the bus service discontinued. some of them are completely packed with people. in the meantime, a lot of the recommendations people are getting, soak this in in, take this in, stay in a safe place. and if you can, find a cool place to wait this out until the lights get back on again. >> for a lot of these tourists, it's adding to their story, to their visit of new york city. they have another thing, they can tell their friends, remember when. as i look behind you, carpet help but notice it seems like a lot of people are packed on the sidewalks. are people waiting outside buildings to see when they may be able to go back in. are they more just looking, kind

of looky lous, looking to see what's going on outside? what's the sense? >> it's really a combination of both, right? before you came to us, i spoke to this gentleman, a young man, daniel. he landed here just a couple days ago from the u.k. this is certainly now part of the experience for him. he has his camera in hand, he's taking shots, and soaking all of this is, in because he does understand the significance of this, the city of new york. that state is something that is fascinating to many, to answer your question, many people, that's all they can do is walk down the sidewalk. talk to each other, check out the sights, snap a picture or two, and hold on to the story, because it is something they won't be forgetting any time soon. >> okay, paolo sandoval for us, in midtown manhattan, when the power is still out, going on two

hours now. with this power outage affecting 42,000 customers at last check. the last update as they're working to restore power and identify what went wrong. stay with us, you're watching cnn. much more of our live coverage just ahead. booking.com offers free so bookers can book now... and ask their boss later. [do you want breakfast or no?] free cancellations! [definitely breakfast.] how good is that? be a booker at booking.com. we run right into these crises, and we do not leave until normalcy is restored. we'd been working for days on a site in a storm devastated area. a family pulled up. it was a mom and her kids. everything they had had been washed away. the only thing that brought any kind of solace was the ability to hand her a device so she could call her family and let them know that she was okay. (vo) there for you when it matters most. join us and get up to $650 when you switch. that's verizon.

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west side. we've seen flickers, the lights went out. no lights, no air conditioning on this hot july 9th for some people. in the theaters that have had to now shut down tonight. no productions and certain broadway shows. ironically tonight is the 42nd anniversary of the famous 1977 blackout. we know some people have been trapped in elevators, the new york city police and fire department are still working to get all of them out. and to monitor what they call crowd control. i spoke to bill de blasio, he's not in the city tonight, he's campaigning in woot waterloo, i. >> we are getting the preliminary reports, it appears to be a transmission problem. con ed is working to address it now.

your numbers are right, at this moment, the information we have is about 40,000 customers affected. all of our first responders have been deployed now, folks who are in elevators will be responded to by our vice president, our police department. so this situation is being addressed very rapidly, a lot of personnel being sent to the west side of manhattan to address it. what appears to be, anna, is a specific transmission problem and that means hopefully it can be resolved in a relatively quick time. >> you tweeted out there was a manhole fire, is that believed to be the cause? >> we're still getting more information. and this is very early on in the situation, anna, we're waiting to get all the facts, what i'm trying to make clear is, it's something within the normal electrical grid that didn't work. no other kind of external influence here, this appears to be something that went wrong in

the way they transmit power from one part of the city to the other, to address demand. con ed will give us an update soon on resolving it. in the meantime, our focus is making sure that anyone has immediate needs, our first responders will get to them right away. >> are you confident nothing nefarious is going on here? >> at this point, it's very important to say when we're an hour or so into a situation, we should never overstate the facts. i talked to our police commissioner and deputy commissioner. from what we're seeing at this moment, this is simply a mechanical problem, and one again that sounds like it is addressable in a reasonable period of time. >> do you know, has con edison identified what the problem is? >> i don't have the details, i know they know where the problem occurred in their system, it is there in the west side of manhattan where it occurred. to the best of my understanding,

one of the lanes between some of their substations had a problem. but at this point, limited even though it is a busy part of the city as you indicated, it is limited to that one part of the city, and hopefully from everything we're seeing, it will stay right there. >> you said it's limited, but initial reports were 20,000 people without power, then it was 27,000 people without power. now it's 42,000 people without power. it seems like it's still growing. if it's limited and they've identified what it was, why are the numbers still going up? >> anna, i think the point is, again, everything is preliminary information, we should be clear about this, until all is looked at, we can give all the facts, i don't want to overstate anything. what i do know at this point, it's a limited part of manhattan, nothing something that at least at this moment has any impact beyond the west side of manhattan. that seems to be a real problem,

but it seems contained. >> subway systems, mass transit used by millions of people. how often do you prepare for something like this? >> how do you do it? >> it's rare, i have to say. we -- no, we prepare all the time, we have in the office of emergency management that prepares with fire department, with police department for exactly these scenarios, i have to tell you, blackouts have become rare in new york city. i'm hopeful again this is something that will be a limited duration, but no, we used to have a fair number of them. and lately, certainly in the six years i've been mayor, they've been rare in the scheme of things. >> are you planning to return to new york city? >> i'm going to get more information in the next hour or so, and we'll adjust my schedule accordingly, depending on what i hear. >> what are your biggest concerns right now? >> my biggest concern initially was to make sure there was no foul play. and again, until everything is resolved, everything is looked

at, we can never say anything definitively, at this moment, it appears to be a mechanical issue. what we're seeing is something mechanical. the next concern, of course, is for anyone in a situation where they need immediate help, and that's the folks in the elevators, especially, i understand there's two subway trains as well, that help is going to right now. they have air conditioning, lights on, i'm told. those passengers will be gotten off those trainings immediately. those are the folks i'm concerned about first, of course, we're going to do everything we can with con ed to get that power back on. >> it's unusual to see new york city in the dark, that's what we're seeing right now. while you're on the road, who is the point person in charge of new york city on the ground right now. >> first deputy mayor who is going to the scene as we speak.

deanne kriswell, all those folks are attending to the issue right now. >> what do you think of the fact that this is 42 years to the day of the famed new york blackout of 1977. >> i'll tell you, that was one of the most difficult days in terms of -- nothing compares to a 911. that one lives in legend. it was so shocking and in the middle of the night my wife was on a subway train in fact. we haven't seen anything like that in a long long time. thank god. hopefully here we have a situation that can be handled quickly. the impact, and just get things back to normal quickly. >> for those who have left their apartments or hotel rooms or their grocery store, wherever they were and gone outside, because they don't know what

else to do, what do you tell them? >> what should new yorkers do right now if they're affected by this blackout? >> we're going to get information out to people constantly. i wanted to be with you here to get people facts as we know them at this minute. we're going to be getting information out over the next few hours. other folks, if they think it's important to get out of the building and get outside, it may be more comfortable outside. that makes sense, the rest of the city, obviously, the rest of manhattan operating normally. what we want to do is get down to the bottom of how long it's going to take to fix it, and get that word out to people immediately, and then we'll be able to give them bigger instruction about how to hand el the coming hours. >> as soon as you have any information, please let us know. >> we know you have a lot to tend to right now. we appreciate you taking the time, thank you. we have a new update from

the nypd counter terrorism bitter handle, con edison is working to restore power in the west side of manhattan. power outage was due to a manhole fire. please remain calm and stay safe, nypd units remain deployed in the city. they're working to restore power to 45,000 customers in the dark tonight. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

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just in to cnn as we continue our breaking news coverage. the governor now putting out a statement calling for an investigation. calling this power outage unacceptable. let me read you this statement from the governor. earlier this evening, a widespread blackout occurred as a result of an issue. in midtown manhattan. the power outages disrupted subway service on the acdf and m lines, no passenger s are stranded on trains or elevators, there are no reports of injuries at this time. he says, i have directed the state police, the mta and public

service commission to aggressively respond to this incident. and work to restore power as soon as possible. we are in constant communication with con ed, who has an effort underway to begin restoration of power by midnight tonight. the governor is saying, they hope to have power restoration underway by midnight. he goes on to say, no injuries occurred as a result of this incident. the fact that it happened at all. i'm directing the department of public service to investigate and identify the exact cause of the outages. to prevent an incident of this magnitude. we will ensure the safety and security of new yorkers that's the latest hoping to restore power by midnight saying he wants an investigation into how

this can happen. one of the most iconic parts of new york, broadway has been forced to cancel shows. that sent hundreds of disappointed audience members pouring into the streets outside, take a look at this. this video from earlier this evening as the sun was setting, a lot of these people now just waiting to see what's next. the cancellations did not stop one group of actors from performing. we want to show you an amazing moment from the cast of a broadway musical. their show was cancelled, they took it outside. ♪ >> again, that's from the cast of come from away on broadway. living up to the old adage, the show must go on. blackout or not.

paolo sandoval is with us now. that was a fun moment. i'm sure at this point, a couple hours later, people are starting to say what's up? update us on where you are. >> it seems like it's come in stages, there was concern in the beginning, and then as people begin to get word there's no foul play involved. there's -- as they get to hear more about what happened, there's concern. now they've reached that point, where they're wondering, how long is this going to last. as you begin to hear from people here on their -- there's certainly some heart breaks, people who didn't catch your show. and this lovely family joining us from st. louis. is this your first time? >> no, no. >> it's my son's first time, my second time. >> it's your first time visiting the city, in a partial blackout? >> yes. >> tell me about what's best, as we wait for this fire truck to pass through, tell me about

what's going through your mind right now, you're staying at a hotel behind us on the 34th floor? >> yes, we're staying at the london, we can't go up to our room. we don't have cell phone batteries, we're out of everything. we can't charge our phones, we're out of -- >> one of us has 47%. >> collectively you have 47% cell phone battery level. >> our chargers are up in our room on the 34th floor, we could only walk to the second floor, they're not allowing people to go any higher. >> the question becomes, where would you even plug them in if you can't find one of these businesses that would take you in? >> right. it is roughly 9:30 here in new york city? >> i think we're going to hang out in times square, maybe -- >> i think we'll be hopeful, it's going to come back. >> you're hopeful you're going to have to lug up 34 flights? >> i don't know that they're letting people do that, they said only to the second floor. >> were you upstairs when things

went down -- >> no, we were out all day, thinking we could finally go back to our room and relax and get our phones charged. >> a friend of ours who lives here alerted us and said there's no power in midtown. so they're going to connecticut and we're -- we'll just give it a try over here. >> you'll wait it out for now, hopefully there's an elevator to take you up to the 35th floor to get those chargers to get back on line? >> that would be nice. >> how long are you in new york city? >> until monday. we also have two more kids that are out with their friends from here, we have no contact with them. >> good how is that as a mom for you? >> we've been talking about that. >> good for the kids, bad for mom and dad. >> yeah, we're a little

concerned. >> all kidding aside, we hope that works out. finally as we look up 7th avenue and to darkness. what goes through your head, as you see this side here? >> yeah. >> it's scary, no lights, nothing. not what i expected from new york. >> how much percent of battery is it. >> 47 plus one, 48. >> 48% in. >> let's make it last. >> so 47. >> thanks for talking to us. >> congrats on that stanley cup win. >> there you go, it gives you an insight. yes, there's a lot of questions being asked hoar, yes, there's plenty of concern, ultimately, both new yorkers and tourists are going to make the best of it. >> yes, they are. well laughter and everything.

going with the flow. >> paolo sandoval reporting for us. getting back to who is affected and the potential cause of all of this. he writes, the blackout is between west 42nd street to 72nd street. nypd has confirmed there is no foul play. fdny are responding to people with the most emergent needs. add they work to restore power. the busy tourist attracts around broadway, times square around carnegie hall. we'll follow more on this

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we're back with the breaking news, large parts of midtown manhattan are experiencing power outages. we have concert goers enjoying a new york city concert at madison square garden with jennifer

lopez when the power suddenly went out. it didn't seem to dampen the mood as the audience turned to clap and cheer. let's see if we can see the mome moment. okay, so this was after the power went out i'm told. cnn's own alexa myrrh an de. take us through what happened? >> hi. we were -- jennifer lopez was about to start her fourth song, and they were about to get the party started, so to speak, and the power just went out. and the dancers were left on stage, jennifer was about to come out, and everybody was sitting there waiting to see what happened next, within about 30 seconds it was pretty clear this had to do with the power outage happening.

>> are you still at the concert? what's happening now? >> we've exited madison square garden. the msg's electrical engineer came on the loud speaker and announced everyone needed to exit the building for security reasons. >> the house was packed. this venue holds 20,000 people. and people are obviously walking out and pointed this is happening. they were here, ready to see her. there was really high energy at the garden today, and a lot of disappointed fans here tonight. >> no doubt about it, how has security reacted to all this. >> i'm sorry, one more time? >> i know you're with a lot of people around you, you're still

dealing with the situation that's an on going situation. when you talk about having to evacuate tens of thousands of people from a venue like this, how did that go? >> i have to say it was pretty orderly, people got out of their seats and exited the nearest stairway, and everything made their way out to the nearest exit. you know, people were not rowdy, everything seemed orderly and organized. i would have thought it would be a little more chaotic. i came to the concert tonight, i brought my mother with me, because we're big j. lo fans. this was supposed to be the big one for us. >> we haven't had one since 2003 i think.

>> this is really something. >> it's very unexpected. i know power outages happen around the country all the time. when it happens in new york city because of the people and the infrastructure we have, it seems to be a big impact when it hits manhattan. thank you, alexa for your update and sharing your experience with us, we know a lot of others were in that concert and are now thinking, when can i get my money back when i see that next concert. >> i'm still trying to get a better sense of how large this outage is, we have the mayor tweeting this goes from 42nd up to 72nd. i nomad son square garden is in the 350s, that would be a bigger area, we're in the 30s here at hudson yards, and we've had power outages here, and been affected by all of this. let's go to someone who can shed some light.

the new york fire department commissioner for many years, including during september 11th. the nypd says no foul play, this was caused by a manhole fire. what does that mean? >> it all made sense up until the -- the latest report that the garden was affected also. because from 50th street to 70th street, once you drop down to 7th and the garden you wonder if con ed has got control of it. i think there's going to be a press conference in a while. they'll be able to give everybody a better briefing on whether they're able to control it, isolate it and bring it back. those folks that are stuck outside of the hotel are hoping to get back in there in the next hour or couple hours. the fire department dispatchers are going crazy.

they're doing a great job, the elevators are stuck, it's real warm weather, when you lose air conditioning, and you're stuck in an elevator, especially if it's crowded. it could be threatening to folks that are older and don't have that -- are healthy enough to with stand it. emergency management does a great job in this time also they have lists of all the people that need electric, when electric is lost. you have police, fire, guys running around nuts trying to help as many people as they can. and if if this spreads, it becomes a bigger and bigger problem, of course. >> we're looking at ariels right now over new york city, provided by our affiliate, it gives us a sense of the breadth of this outage it's eye opening to look more closely and not see new york city lit up.

this is a city that never sleeps, right? it's in the dark right now. and the extent of this outage may not be known just yet. as they pointed out, they thought it was a limited area, we haven't seen a new update from con ed. it all started a few hours ago. those numbers continue to grow, and the area continues to grow. i'm looking on social media right now, somebody lost power at west. th and 10th avenue, they just lost power in the last several minutes, you said the fact that it may be a bigger area is even more bigger area is even more concerning. concerning in what way? that they don't know the actual cause? >> it overwhelms the system. and it is so warm and there are so many tourists in town. we have great systems, a lot of extra power generation, a lot of

secondary power. you saw the evacuation of madison square garden. that doesn't happen orderly if you don't have a lot of secondary power come on. all that emergency lighting came on. that makes a lot of difference. people are able to get out of these places safely. the hotels have good staircases, emergency lighting, a lot of them have backup generators for all kinds of other services. you can't do everything you normally do, and lose a lot of air-conditioning and have to shut down things that use that much more energy. but we have a, even when we have a blackout, we're not totally blacked out, there's people, a lot of emergency lighting that's going on. but if it spreads, not that we can't handle it, but it just -- it becomes tougher and tougher for fire, police, emergency, medical service, everybody. >> quickly, if you will, tom, what's your best advice for those who are affected right now to stay safe? >> well, it's different for

everybody, you know? those hotel folks, they're going to hang out in times square, that's great. if you're someone who needs air-conditioning because you have trouble, respiratory problems and you're on 12th floor of an apartment building, hopefully you can get word to someone to get some help because you can only go three or four hours without getting some comfort. hopefully people have plans in place where they have people look out for them, friends, relatives, people in the building, and try to get word and as you heard people say before, if you don't have a real emergency, try not to bother. if you're just warm and uncomfortable, don't be bothering energy services. they are really busy right now trying to help people that are in more desperate need. >> thank you so much, thomas von

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it's breaking news right now on cnn. much of manhattan is in the dark. no lights, no electricity. it's a blackout. look at these pictures. this is the city that never sleeps. this area is normally completely lit up. tens of thousands of people, though, now without power in new york city, mostly in the midtown

part of the city, around times square, around central park. it's all results, we're told, of a manhole fire. we're staying on top of this story but also need to check on tropical storm barry. barry roared ashore from the gulf of mexico into louisiana as a category 1 hurricane earlier today before weakening, but the worst may still be yet to come. forecasters are telling people along the entire gulf coast that flood waters are coming and rain could be dumping and those floodwaters could remain high. well into next week. let's get right to meteorologist chad myers in the cnn weather center. chad, what more can you tell us? >> this is a real head scratcher here, ana. this storm has stayed offshore, almost all day, even though the eye or the center is now onshore. the heaviest rainfall has remained off, except for one band that moved over new orleans about an hour ago, even some tornado warnings to the east of new orleans about an hour ago or

so. but right now, 50 miles per hour going to be down probably i would say to 45 by the 11:00 advisory. we'll see. i don't see much spin here. but still rain in the gulf. a lot of rain in the gulf. heavy rain in the gulf that refuses to come onshore and that's great news. because that is removing the amount of rainfall that we're going to see every time another thunderstorm pops up in the gulf and it rains over the water, it means it's not raining over land. now, there are still some storms up near slidell and a few of those up to the north and some of the northern parishes may spin for a while. there may be more tornadoes along the area, but for now, i think we're going to be doing okay. there will still be heavy rain. this is the forecast radar. this is what the radar should look like for a computer models thinking for the rest of the night. more rain coming through baton rouge, morgan city, new orleans. so, yes, there's more weather coming through, but even as i see this, this is 5 or 6 inches, not 20. that's good news. good news. chad myers, thank you for that

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you are live in the "cnn newsroom." i'm ana cabrera in new york. the breaking news right now on cnn, much of manhattan is in the dark right now on this saturday night. it's been more than three hours of little lights, no electricity, no air-conditioning across a very large swath of manhattan, the busiest part of

new york city. tha the famous electric billboards in times square, many of them are in the dark. theaters closed their doors. con edison estimates 51,000 customers are without power. the numbers are still climbing as they are working to restore service. the police department is poi pointing to a manhole fire as the cause. and according to the mayor, bill de blasio, no foul play is involved. however, it is worth noting, we're just getting word, the mayor is returning to new york city from the campaign trail. he's currently in iowa. so for now, much of manhattan on a hot saturday night in july is in the dark. let's go live to polo sandoval joining us from the streets where the power is out. polo, fill us in on what's happening there now. >> reporter: you know, ana, when mayor de blasio returns from the campaign trail, he's going to find some of those 50,000 customers basically in the streets here. important to point out it's already been several hours that

people have been in the dark. so many of these people have to take to the streets, either on a motorcycle or on foot, including some of the folks who have traveled here all the way from south texas. hector and denise, step right up here. i can't believe that we are running into each other. you are from my hometown of mcallen, texas. >> correct. and we were walking by and we saw you. >> reporter: so you're certainly going to find just about anybody here on the streets. hector, tell me a little bit what it's been like for you and your daughter here celebrating her sweet 16. this is not what you expected when you came here to the big apple for the first time from texas, is it? >> no, but we've enjoyed every minute here in new york. unfortunately, the lights did go out, but we're going to make the best of it and go down for a walk, so we came down the street and ran into you. >> i just spoke to some people who were staying in your hotel, they were on the 25th or 26th floor, so there was no chance that they were going to be hiking up those stairs. for you, you said you were on the 14th floor. >> we're on the 20th floor. coming down was easy, but i'm

pretty sure going back up will be really hard. so we're just going to stay down here until the lights come back on. >> how about your phones? do you have new power in case this goes a couple more hours? >> luckily, i have my backup, so i do have power. >> what's next for you, denise? you're celebrating your 16th birthday, the lights went out in new york just for you, maybe. what happens next, though? is this a story you're going to get to tell your friends when you head back to texas? >> definitely. i'll have a lot of things to tell them about this. my first time being in new york, also. >> so you probably saw what this looks like, usually all lit up. pretty significant, stark difference. >> yes. >> dad, what's next for you then, depending on when power will come back or not, what are you going to do tonight? >> tonight we'll head back to the hotel, get some rest, and tomorrow we'll go see a yankee game against the blue jays and ellis island after that and enjoy the rest of the week here in new york. >> i've been asked about the heat. back where we're from, the heat

index is about 115 degrees. but it's still a little warm. >> a different kind of heat over here, but we've managed to get through it. but nothing like the valley heat, so it's tolerable. >> made it through 115, you'll make it through this, right? all right. thank you so much, hector, denise. best of luck. happy birthday to you. >> thank you. >> thanks so much more talking to us on cnn. safely travels back home to the rio grande valley. ana, again, we mentioned this in the last hour, people are going to make the best of it. yes, we're just a couple of blocks away from times square and central park, so we are getting to see and speak to a lot of tourists who say this is a bump in the road for them for their vacation, but we're also speaking to native new yorkers who said many of them have been through it in the '70s, in 2003, and they'll get through it again today. >> and it looks like traffic is continuing to flow in a rather orderly way. is that fair to say? >> reporter: it is. i've seen officers at some intersections. we are still close enough to the

part of manhattan that still has power, that still has traffic lights moving. but you take a drive or walk just a couple of blocks west of where i'm standing and many of those lights are out. that's where the nypd and traffic control has their officers out there in full force, basically making sure that nobody gets hurt. and i'll tell this to you again. it was really impress to see some local business owners and employees to take to the streets with fluorescent vests to direct traffic, taking things into their own hands to make sure that everybody stays safe. but ultimately, the nypd is stepping in to make sure that both pedestrians and drivers are staying safe right now. >> okay, polo sandoval in new york city for us on the streets. thank you. important to note, the numbers continue to climb in terms of power outages and those who are affected. we just got another update from con edison, 61,000 customers that are saying are now in the dark here in new york city and manhattan. these areals provided by wabc over the city, where you can see just how dark it is. we also have an update from

amtrak, of course, which operates a number of trains that come into new york's penn station. and accordingly, apparently, new york's penn station is now operating off backup generators. they're tweeting, trains, they say are not being affected at this time. we do know the subways, those who use mass transit in that form are impacted. in fact, there are very few subway lines still operating right now as, again, they work to get a handle on this power outage. mayor bill de blasio, he has been out on the campaign trail in iowa. he now is returning to new york city to deal with this blackout. power outages that are affecting, again, more than 61,000 customers at this point. cnn's brian stelter joins us on the phone right now. brian, what's your reaction to that? the mayor now returning to new york city. >> i think a lot of new yorkers are going to have something to say to de blasio when he gets back. obviously, a lot of manhattanites have not been happy that he's been running for president in the first place.

but i'll leave the politics until tomorrow, ana. and a story is a story. i just opened the door of my house to start to cover. i've been talking to my mayors and looking outside because i'm in this blackout zone. and it is a very rare event. to see one of the country's biggest cities pass out of power, it's a little bit reminisce isn't of the superstorm sandy blackout. in that case, that was a natural disaster. the southern half of the island was without power. in this case, it's the western half of midtown that's lost power. so there's a dividing line which is fifth avenue and some people on the west side are just walking over to the east side for now. there's, of course, like my family is staying inside for now, just waiting for the power to come back. it is kind of a quiet night, ana, except for all the sirens. we are hearing a lot of fire trucks, ambulances responding to elevator outages and things like that. for some people, blackouts can be exciting, tourists who are excited to be here for it. i think for others, it can be

very stressful. if you may not be in a very well health, in poor health, your maw nigh need for various reasons. so we are hearing as i'm talking right now, we had more fire trucks coming down the streets that i live on. and in the windows nearby, i see people with candles, people with flashlights, basically getting ready for a long night ahead. >> okay. stand by for us, brian. i want to bring in new york's governor, andrew cuomo. thank you, governor, for taking the time. first, what is the latest update you can tell us about this outage. >> a pleasure to be with you, ana. i think that brian's assessment was right on. what apparently happened was conn edison, the utility provider for manhattan had a substation malfunction. fire, explosion, but a substation malfunction, which then generated a surge of power

that put out as many as five additional substations. when one substation malfunctions, it's common that it sends a surge of power through the line. that surge can either burn the transmission line or can cause the next sequential substation to malfunction. the more substations malfunction, the greater the power outage. and now you're looking at an area of about 40th street, maybe even down to 34th street, on the southern side to about 58 to 65th street, from broadway to the west side of manhattan. that's towards the hudson river. but it is a very large area for manhattan. there's the personal inconvenience, obviously. there's afternoon inconvenience and a possible dangerous situation for senior citizens, people who are on medical

equipment at home. the trains are also out. we -- luckily, we have no reports of anyone stuck in a train. the trains have all made it to the station and people are out. >> and when you talk about trains, are you talking about subways or these other trains that amtrak runs? >> in that part of manhattan, it's basically all subways. >> yeah. >> and being stuck in the subway tunnel is obviously not a fun experience. but that our information is, there's no one in a train, the traffic lights are out. i'm sending state police and i've called up national guard to help with any traffic control, because these are very busy intersections, and it can get chaotic very quickly. but it's a serious situation. it's not just a personal inconvenience. new yorkers have all been very well behaved. we expect this to be a short-term situation, but if

it's a long-term situation and you know power goes out, police are busy doing other things, alarms don't function, et cetera, so, it creates an opportunity for a certain amount of chaos, obviously, and i'll just leave it at that. we don't yet have a good estimate as to how long it should take to restore the power. they're still doing an assessment. i have state energy personnel with them. i'm en route to the transformers to see the actual extent of the damage myself. and then -- >> so, governor, do you believe that this problem could still get worse before it gets better? because we know that the numbers are still rising. >> the numbers are rising because the transformer that

malfunctioned caused the second to malfunction, caused the third to malfunction. >> it's like a domino effect. >> yes. now, that for tomorrow, the after-action report, the system is designed to have breakers between the substations. for a substation to malfunction is not that infrequent an occurrence. they're supposed to be designed with breakers in between the substations. if one substation malfunctions and sends a surge, it's supposed to trip a breaker rather than burn a transmission line or damage another substation. so that's going to be an after-action analysis that we're going to do. because we shouldn't be in this situation. >> you put out a statement calling this unacceptable.

>> well, look, i've handled a number of emergency in this state. i used to be in the federal government under the clinton administration. i did emergency management all across the country. this is a predictable circumstance. substations malfunction. the system has to have safe guards designed into it so one substation malfunction does not domino into other substations, which is apparently what has happened here. but we'll get to the after-action after the action. the first call of duty is public safety, traffic control, additional law enforcement, because it is harder to police a blacked out city. and we're doing that, state police, national guard, and new york ers have all taken it in

stride, as brian's comments suggest that new yorkers have been accustomed to a lot and deal with a lot and so far, so good. >> and we're also hearing from people that our polo sandoval is interviewing are tourists. they're not from new york, but they, too, seem to be taking this in stride and trying to soak up their unique new york experience. i do want to get back to something you said about safety and this is important. because we just got this now from the new york city police department. it's for people planning to drive in manhattan during this blacko blackout. we know a lot of people are leaving their homes because of them being stuck in the dark. no air-conditioning. and so, i want to make sure everybody gets this information. it says, due to the power outage and disabled traffic control devices, vehicles should avoid west 42nd street, west 74th street, 5th avenue, 12th avenue. only mta buses will be permitted in that area. what is your message to people who may try to drive on dark

streets and on potentially very crowded streets. >> yeah. let's qualify what the nypd are saying. we're going to have certain routes that will be for buses only to operate. but ana, no one should be driving through that area. every intersection is chaotic. just picture an uncontrolled intersection with very high volume of traffic at night, without enough personnel to man or a person every intersection. it is chaotic. so you should not be driving in that area unless it's a true emergency. because all you need is a couple of traffic accidents in those intersections and then you'll see the situation deteriorate even more. so i would urge people just not

to drive through that area. if you're in the area and you need to leave your home, it's a several-block walk. it's basically broadway west to the hudson river. that's about mid-manhattan. but walk several blocks, get to the east side of manhattan. and take public transportation or cab or whatever, but you shouldn't be driving through the blacked out area. >> a short time ago, i spoke to mayor bill de blasio. he's campaigning in iowa. he now says he's returning to new york to deal with this emergency. governor, how important is it that the mayor be there personally? >> look, mayors are important. and situations like this come up, you know. and you have to be on site. i believe that i'm governor of

new york and have been for eight years, i can count the number of times i leave the state basically on my fingers. you know, job one is when a situation like this happens, these situations happen more and more frequently. we have tornadoes, we have storms, we have superstorms. all sorts of natural disasters, emergency emergencies come up all the time. so i think it's important to be in a place where you can always respond, but look, everybody makes their own political judgment and i'm not going to second-guess anyone either. i do my job the way i think i should do my job and i leave it to others to do the same. >> new york governor andrew cuomo, we really appreciate you taking the time to give us all the latest information on this blackout situation. again, parts of manhattan, some 61,000 plus customers currently in the dark with con edison

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no trade minimums. and yes, it's all at one low price. td ameritrade. ♪ breaking news. con edison now reporting some good news. 30,000 customers, we're told, are still affected by the new york city blackout, which at one point affected more than 60,000

people. that was just before the break. governor andrew cuomo who we just spoke to said he'll ask the national guard to help with traffic control. the concern be the danger of drivers on dark streets. you can see how dark it is out there now. i want to bring in samantha vinograd. obviously, this is an issue so many people in such a small area when we're talking about manhattan. the good news is, it sounds like they may be starting to restore power. but when you hear national guard, though sounds serious. >> we have to think about the different kinds of people impacted. we have the new york residents. coned just said the power is going to be restored to tens of thousands more by midnight. that's positive. but we have several thousands tourists that are currently in the city for a variety of reasons. i was just add the jennifer lopez concert. we were evacuated from madison square garden. and i heard many concertgoers indicating that they were trapped in manhattan because long island rail road and other forms of transportation were potentially down. national guard can be deployed

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-conditioning because of how they were dealing with this. that is a very serious concern. you talk about the j.lo concert.

we know it was at madison square garden. the power went out there. i want to show the incredible moment where jennifer lopez was set to perform for the concertgoers. when that power went out, the lights you see on right now are the emergency lights. this was what that moment looked like for j.lo. >> hi, guys. so we're backstage. they just told me to get off stage. i was waiting there. obviously, all the power went out in the city and obviously here at madison square garden while we were in the middle of our show. actually, we had just started our show. they're asking everybody to evacuate very slowly and calmly. and that's what we're going to have to do. obviously, we're going to reschedule this show. there's the alarm going off telling everybody in the announcements to evacuate. i am obviously heartbroken and devastated -- here we go. >> due to a citywide power outage, we are going to interrupt this event. >> i'm very sad. >> smt interest of safety as a

precautionary measure, we're asking that all occupants leave the building. >> we -- i'm so sorry that this happened in the middle of our moment. at this time, i'm going to get back to you guys as soon as i can with when we're going to reschedule the show. okay? >> okay. there you have it. j.lo captioning that video, saying the power is out in new york city and at msg, madison square garden. heartbroken to say tonight's show is canceled. we will reschedule. love you all. stay safe. again, sam, you were there. what was it like from your perspective at that moment? >> well, there was confusion originally. but i will say that the madison square garden security team handled this beyond professionally. there's an orderly evacuation from the building, but panic really started to ensue as young children were on the escalators, which weren't working, trying to get out to the street. and the backup generators did kick in, but as we were exiting the building, all of the lights were off and that caused a lot of the children to have concern. and a lot of people that had

travelled into the city for the concert to question how they were going to get home, if they could afford to pay for hotels overnight and really if they were stranded in manhattan with no options. and there's also the concern, of course, that while things are dark, crime levels are higher. governor cuomo alluded to this in his remarks. he said that policing is more difficult in the dark, which is why he indicated that he's sending more law enforcement professionals immediately to the city to try to make sure that there's not more crime while people are stranded on the island and while the lights are off. so security professionals are dealing with evacuating buildings, making sure high-risk individuals have the emergency services that they need. and then trying to make sure again that crime levels don't rise as a result of this issue while this critical infrastructure is being looked at and coned is working to try to get it back up and running. >> he called this unacceptable, the fact that this could even happen. your take? >> this is critical infrastructure in one of the largest cities in the world. it seems incredible that a power

outage could happen like this and affect tens of thousands of people and backup systems would not jump into action immediately. again, this is new york city. this is an't a small town in th middle of nowhere. and i think he took a jab at mayor de blasio for this. he had some harsh words for him, including the fact that mayor de blasio is out campaigning right now and is not in new york city. thing governor cuomo tried to be as diplomatic as he could be, but this will be a real issue for mayor de blasio. why he could not guarantee the provision of essential services in manhattan if he's planning to run for president. >> he is coming back to new york city tonight. i want to go back live to cnn's polo sandoval. thank you, sam, for being here with us. polo, you say the lights are coming back on? >> reporter: hey, ana, it is kind of interesting here because we did see a building where the lights went back on here at 8th avenue. the next avenue over. it's still unclear whether or not that would be potential generator power that's kicking in. unlikely, but certainly

possible. but that is seen as a good sign, because i count at least two buildings that were dark for the last three hours that are now lit up. and if you look off in the distance here, this hotel, looking at the manhattan, at times square, one of many hotels you find in the region, you also see some light inside and then finally, i'm not sure if we might be able to perhaps go over to the building across the street, where you can also see at least one light that's on. that building was completely dark here not too long ago. so there certainly could be some positive news. the positive news that many people have been waiting for, especially here in the middle of tourist ground zero, where there are millions of people that are wondering if they're actually going to be able to make it back to their hotel room or if they're going to have to essentially hike up all of those stairs if the elevators aren't working. so again, it looks like the situation looks fairly promising in this time that i've been talking to you, another building, the lights are back on here in midtown.

so, again, it looks like the situation is improving significantly for many people here in midtown, as many of the buildings, the lights begin to go back on. but we're still waiting for an official update from authorities to tell us whether or not this could be over. >> okay. and the con edison is saying that they anticipate most customers will have their power restored by midnight. we are standing by for a presser. in fact, it may be getting underway. let's listen in. >> good evening, everybody. my name is commissioner deann chriswell with new york city of emergency management. i would like to introduce with me here as well, public advocate, jumani williams, brought president. a quick update on 6:47 p.m., there was an electrical disturbance in the system, affecting approximately 62,000 customers in the manhattan area.

this was caused by a power outage on the west side of manhattan. the fire department, police department, and emergency management responded quickly to the scene and we are working closely with coned to restore power as quickly as possible. we have no reports of injuries or fatalities at this time. we also have a list of those individuals on life-saving equipment and we are working with them to make sure they have what they need and they have put together a joint task force with pd and the fire department to make sure that nobody is stuck in an elevator still. right now, i would like to turn it over to the ceo of coned, john mcavoy, to give an update from coned. >> good evening. thanks very much. my name is john mechancavoy. i'm here to represent con edison. we experienced a significant disturbance on the west side of manhattan at one of our electric transmissions stations at

roughly 6:47 p.m. that eventually interrupted power to approximately 73,000 customers. we divide the electric system into what we call a network that's roughly equivalent to neighborhoods. it interrupted power to six networks. we expedited the recovery, performed an initial assessment of what was the most likely cause, isolated that equipment, inspected the other equipment to identify any obvious abnormalities, and now we have started the restoration process. of the six networks that we lost, we have restored two of those networks, starting from just before 10:00 p.m. and we are working to restore the remaining four networks by midnight tonight. now, there are some unknowns in this. as we restore equipment, we may find damage that we're not currently aware of. but we are proceeding on a path to restore all customers,

hopefully, by midnight tonight. we'll then look at the root causes of the event and restore the system to a fully normal condition once we understand exactly what occurred and what caused the outages that we're all experiencing today. >> mr. mcavoy, do you know exactly why this happened? it's not an especially hot day and thankfully it's a saturday in which businesses and people aren't in their offices. >> right. it does not appear related to excessive load, as sometimes has occurred in the past. when we have an incident like this, we focus first on isolation of the failed equipment or the most likely failed equipment and then restoration of the customers. and when commerce are restored is when we really do the full root cause investigation to identify what may have caused it. that will follow later today. >> the lights just went on behind you! how do you feel about that? >> good job, good job. >> i feel just as well as everyone in the crowd. >> by the way, you're good at

what you do. >> people heard explosions. do we know what that was -- >> so i can't speak to the explosions that they may have heard. when you have incidents like this, large circuit breakers, which are the high-voltage equipment of circuit breakers in a panel in your house, operate. and they are very loud when they operate. that could have been what they heard, but i can't know for sure because there were restoration attempts made. >> were there fires in the manholes at any point. >> i did hear a report of a fire in a manhole. we'll investigate. very unlikely that fire in a manhole was the cause of an incident of this scale. >> this has happened occasionally in our city. what do you think could be the cause of two incidences at the same time? >> yeah, really not able to estimate what could have been caused this. we have to go through uh the full engineering analysis to look at the data, facts, and the equipment conditions to identify

the cause. >> we know know how many more networks back on since this one -- >> well, we had two out of six back. we definitely got a third out of six. i'm looking to the team to see if anybody has any updated -- >> three more came back. >> how many do we still have out, hugh? >> one. >> we have five of the six networks restored, one network remains to be restored. the pennsylvania network, which is roughly 42nd street to 32nd street. to roughly broadway/seventh avenue. >> do you expect anymore outages tonight with these possible unknowns? >> no, we do not expect any additional outages this evening. >> i have a question for the nypd. a lot of people saw regular new yorkers jumping in to direct traffic. didn't see a lot of police officers. i was actually in front of a precinct, didn't see any police officers jumping in. can you explain what the protocol is for something like that in an emergency?

>> good evening. i'm chief steve hughes, the commanding officer of south, we did all the mobilization, bringing units from around the city. from fifth avenue to the west side, we implemented a vehicle traffic freeze. we were just letting city buses up at that point, stopping civilian traffic from going in there. we were in the process of bringing all the units in to post officers around on each of the blocks. so there is a significant uniform presence out there now. >> can you just speak to new yorkers though stepping and when police weren't there taking charge. >> we appreciate their assistance. i heard reports, new york one had a gentlemen -- an elderly gentlemen with a cane out assisting purpose. our purpose was to stop the traffic from coming into the area and that's what we were focussing on first. >> chief, what do you say about the new york spirit, 1977, people jumped in the intersections to help out. i was one back then. what do you say about new yorkers going through so much? >> it was 42 years ago tonight that we had the blackout. so tonight, a totally different

situation tonight. people came together and we handled it pretty well. thank you. >> where's mayor bill de blasio? should he be here at this point? >> he's running for president and he's in waterloo, iowa. >> i would like to just thank everybody for coming out here tonight. as you can see, we have one network that is still down. we are going to continue to work closely together with pd and fire and con edison. we'll get that up as soon as possible. the cooperation here has been excellent. that's why we've been able to get it restored as quickly as we have. and thank you again very much for coming out tonight. >> do we know if anybody's in elevators, do we still have any issues with that? >> yeah, again, we did have -- we have a task force that has been going to all of the affected buildings and make sure nobody was in elevators. i have not gotten any reports at this moment, but we have a task force going building to building, for those buildings that were still outs. >> any reports of injuries with this sort of thing? reports of injuries -- >> there were no reports of injuries or fatalities.

and i have been personally in touch with the mayor to give him an update on the situation. thank you very much. >> okay. that was live for you right here as we're getting an update on the situation, the power outage affecting a lot of people in new york city. tens of thousands at one point, the height was 73,000 customers according to the ceo of coned, who was briefing the media there. and in fact, as he was briefing, power went on behind him. we have that moment. let's play it. >> -- root cause investigation to identify what may have caused it -- >> the lights just went on behind you! how do you feel about that? >> good job. good job. i feel just as well as -- >> you're good at what you do. >> you heard that big cheer as the power went on, as he was speaking. he says, there were six different outlets, six different

stations that were affected as part of their network, six networks, and he said now five of the six have been restored. and he doesn't have an exact estimate as to when that last one restored, when that press conference started, two of the six were working. now it's five of six, just in the last few minutes. he hoped to have all of the power restored by midnight. important to note, though, they still don't know exactly what caused this. they said they don't believe it was overload. and he doesn't believe it was a manhole fire, which is what nypd was tweeting out earlier, blaming that for this power outage. he said, that would be highly unlikely. he said their initial focus is to restore power and then the investigation would get into exactly what caused this power outage. let's go back live to polo sandoval, who has been in the middle of this area that's been without power. and polo, are you seeing all the lights go back on there? >> reporter: just a few here. just to give you an idea of

where we are, we're basically in midtown. times square is just a couple of blocks in front of me. if you walk about ten blocks north of where i'm standing, you'll end up in central park. so from our vantage point, we have a clear shot of the lights of times square, a small handful of those big l.e.d. screens, those big billboards that did go out, are back on. there's one at the marriott marquis that was out for a while. i see that back on. and to the right of me, i can basically look just over this block here and the building that you're table to see a couple of floors lit up, that's basically on eighth avenue. you can keep going. that will make it to ninth avenue. that was pitch dark in the last 30 minutes or so, that has lit up. and as weapon continue to pan over as we look north, you can see some light from our vantage point. however, as you continue to look north towards central park, there are still some buildings that appear to be dark. so it really does speak or at least it shows, demonstrates what we heard at that press conference that we are restoring

power in certain sections, so we certainly were not expecting for all of this to come back on at one particular moment. we expected this would be a slow and steady restoration process. ly tell you this, though. every light that comes back on is certainly a welcome sight for people in this part of new york city. there are many people here, there are tourists -- i have spoken to people from as far as uk, from mexico who have traveled a long way to be here, to catch a show, to check out a tour, and this is certainly throwing a wrench in their plans, but i have to tell you, ana, you and i have been hearing from tourists all evening, their spirits are certainly high. they are very hopeful that this will not dampen their mood. they say, we'll have dinner somewhere. people still happy. we'll have dinner, grab a drink, and wait this out. and it appears to be that the situation is slowly improving as we continue to see some of the buildings get lit back up again. >> fingers crossed that stays the same. we have no reports of any injuries or fatalities, according to new york city emergency management through all

of this, despite a little bit of panic and chaos, people stuck in elevators, people who have life-saving equipment that need power, obviously, impacted by all of this, in which they said they've been in contact with those people. they have a list and they're also doing some inspections to make sure people are safe. thank you, polo, for your continued reporting on this. brian stelter is also out and about on the streets. we see the flashing lights behind you, breinian, but are t streetlights returning? i know you're near columbus circle. >> reporter: yes, and this is the one part of the city that still does not have power. of those six networks that the officials described, this is the one part of the city without power and that is why these police officers are right behind me. as soon as the horses -- the horse carriages head home for the evening, you can see some of the police officers directing traffic on central park south. this is central park south where there is no power. think about famed hotels like the plaza hotel, the essex house. those buildings still without

power. however, ana, during that press conference, we did see buildings on the other side start to regain power. the trump international hotel, time warner center by columbus circle. some of the big apartment buildings on the upper west side did suddenly light up. and i'm holding this glow stick, because this is the glow sticks that some of the residents here are carrying around. this is what they've been handed when they're trying to go up and down 20 or 30 flights of stairs in some cases. this is the one part of the city still without power, but i would say people are taking it in stride for the most part. the initial stress of this has calmed down a bit. i think what we are left with is a reminder of just how fragile these grids really are. it's remarkable how much all of us, whether you're a resident or a tourist or an emergency management official, how we take for granted the power grid and the ability to get online and have air-conditioning, et cetera. a good reminder for new york city tonight about how all of that is sometimes very fragile.

>> no doubt about it. brian stelter reporting for us. keep us posted on when the lights go on near you. because, again, that's apparently the one area that has not been restored just yet. thank you very much, brian stelter. again, the latest reporting now, five of the six networks that were without power are back on, so there's still one more they're still working to restore power. but much of new york city has been in the dark for the last several hours is rejoicing tonight as the power slowly comes back on. a live look overhead right now as we take a quick break. we'll be right back. bookers are booking

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breaking news. and the lights are coming back on in parts of manhattan after a big blackout this evening. con edison now working to restore power after this outage that hit much of midtown and the upper west side. coned hoping for all the lights to be restored by midnight. and you can seep the lights shining once again, some of those iconic buildings. this is what it looked inside the knickerbocker hotel on 42nd street and broadway. this is right after the outage. you can see firefighters working

to rescue people who were struck in the elevator in this hotel after the power went out. and cnn's richard roth joins us now on the phone. richard, your own apartment lost power. what's it been like around you tonight? >> i had a hunch i spent my saturday night navigain manhatte thousands of others, sitting in the dark, either listening to a transistor radio or some other device or some entertainment, but then i knocked on my neighbor's door, marty, who i've only said a few words over the years in an elevator and he kindly let me in and was letting me use his phone and we were having a little philosophical discussion in the dark, which i think was happening around town. and you look outside at these giant dark skyscrapers, very easy, although i have lived through several other blackouts in manhattan before. and then the lights went on and there was a gigantic cheer from below. and you don't often hear cheers

on the streets of manhattan 18 floors open. i think you'll hear a lot of buildings. i bet there are some couples and people who wish the lights never came back on on a saturday night in new york. >> a rare moment of peace in that regard, when you're overstimulated sometimes, being in the city, when the lights are always shining. were you already in the process of, you know, lighting candles, gathering some of your gear, you know, head lamps and that sort of thing? or were you just -- >> well, i'm not a coal miner with the head lamp -- >> that's me and my colorado girl, who likes to take it to go camping. >> yeah, there's no abandoned gold mine in my building that we've been told about. instead, the building put out a note to all the tenants saying, don't light candles, don't use water, don't flush your toilets, a whole lot of don'ts, as they try to find out what was going on. but you could see some lights just a few blocks away from apartments that were above the

grid, which was knocked out. i think new york dodged a bullet. in 1965, the entire northeast, including manhattan, was knocked out. and that lasted until the next morning. and i was glad we could miss school, i think, that day. but the 1977 blackout, scarier. a lot of looting, a different climate in new york then. and then about 15, 16 years ago, a blackout during rush hour, not pleasant either. the city was not as humid the last two blackouts. i think considering what happened that a few hours of darkness without major damage, people will accept it easily. >> and i think it's so important to also note, you mentioned these different blackouts, 42 years to the day of that famous 1977 new york city blackout, which so many people who have lived in this city for a long time remember because it was so impactful with the looting and the damage and all of that. but you say, this was nothing. this one, compared, right? >> not compared. i remember '77.

i was in greenwich village and i was a cub reporter, you might say, for a college radio station. you go down to city hall, it was dark, people of a certain age might remember abeam, you would never think you were standing next to the mayor of new york and heard police sirens. the bronx was burning was the title of those days in the late '70s. new york's changed a lot, but as brian pointed out in your earlier interview about how we take for granted a lot of what we use and enjoy every day, every minute, when it's taken away, you see how things can change. >> no doubt about it. richard roth, thank you very much for sharing your perspective with us and some of those memories. glad everything is restoring to normal tonight when it comes to the lights in new york city, as we give you these live images of the lights and overhead here in the big apple, where much of the city was in the dark just a few minutes ago, you can see looking more like itself tonight. we'll be right back. a quick break and we'll return

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well, the lights are coming back object in parts of new york city. cnn's polo sandoval has been out on the city streets where it was once dark. you're still there now, polo. are the lights back up and running where you are? how much of the city is back in the light? >> reporter: ana, from my vantage point you can see some of the large billboards in times square that were off, those are back on. some of the buildings west of ninth avenue are starting to light up. down the street, those look dark, but we've been talking to people in the last three hours and it seems the world keeps getting smaller and smaller, here is another family that's been visiting from my native south texas. is this your first time in new york? >> yes, it is. >> reporter: you were telling me

you got stuck on the subway. >> yeah, it was just -- it was something else. >> reporter: was it scary? >> i can't really say i was too scared. i just thought it was something that was just part of, you know -- >> actually we were on the way back from yankee stadium and got stuck in the subway for probably an hour and a half. we came up here and found out that our hotel and everything is shut down. >> reporter: i've asked a lot of the tourists tonight, what are they going to do next. we hear by midnight power should be restored. do you have a plan should that not happen? >> no. we leave tomorrow. >> so this was kind of a weird -- >> reporter: good and bad timing. >> yes. >> reporter: back in south texas where the three of us are from, it feels like 115, 120 degrees in the summertime. how was the heat for you here? are you afraid a hot hotel room

might be too much? >> i'm glad the weather is the way it is right now, because in texas we would have been sweating. >> reporter: this is winter where we're from. >> right. >> reporter: we're so sorry to hear this is the way new york sends you off. but it seems like you're in good spirits. >> yeah. >> it could be worse. >> reporter: it's so nice to talk to you both, enjoy your visit, thanks so much. was the yankee game pretty good? >> we lost, yankees lost. >> reporter: it's been a rough night. folks, thank you so much. spirits are high, the yankees lost but it seems like new york is slowly getting back on line. >> good news, and no injuries, no fatalities. we know firefighters and emergency personnel are continuing to go building to building to make sure people aren't still stuck in elevators. so that situation is still developing. we should note there are still parts of new york city without power. it's not all back and up and

running just yet. we'll continue our coverage. in that does it for me for now. i'm ana cabrera. thank you for staying with me. alex marquardt will pick up our coverage of the new york city blackout after a quick break. carrying up to 50 times it's body weight. it never questions the tasks at hand. but this year, there's a more thrilling path to follow. (father) kids... ...change of plans! (vo) defy the laws of human nature... ...at the summer of audi sales event get exceptional offers now! stand up to chronic migraine with botox®. what if you had fewer headaches and migraines a month? botox® prevents headaches and migraines before they even start. botox® is for adults with chronic migraine, 15 or more headache days a month,

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>> announcer: this is cnn breaking news. you are live in the "cnn newsroom" i'm alex marquardt in washington, d.c. taking over for ana cabrera. it is breaking news right now on cnn. and great news for the people living in and visiting new york city on this summer weekend. a power outage that plunged much of manhattan into darkness a few hours ago is gradually, fingers crossed, coming to an end. the building lights are coming back on. the streetlights also coming back on. the power company, con edison, which runs the electric grids, are hopeful that most of their new york city customers will have power once again restored by midnight eastern time. that is in one hour from now. police officials and coned engineers say the blackout was caused by a fire that happened inside a manhole.