Summer Preview: Every Subway Line Lost Power This Morning
Fact: old-timey subways had ceiling fans instead of air conditioners.
This morning I woke up and did what I always do first thing in the morning, namely, fumble for my phone so that I could see what important things had happened while I was away from the Internet for 6 hours straight and what depressing fact did I immediately find out? Oh, only that it was already 81 degrees, even though it was only 7:00 in the morning. (Which, yes, I wake up at 7, even if only to go right back to sleep because I’m not stupid.)
So, yeah. Summer is here. Whee! But with the hot, sticky New York summer mornings comes thing specific to New York in the summer (well, really, let’s face it, year-round), and that is the inevitable issue of subway problems. That’s right, to go with this morning’s humidity and Satan-breathing-in-your-face-after-eating-a-bag-of-zesty-jalapeñ0-potato-chips heat, the MTA announced delays along every single subway line in the system.
As reported by Gothamist, “the MTA said that around 9:35 a.m., Con Ed lost two high tension power feeders, which then caused a power outage to the whole city. Power was restored by 9:41 a.m.” Ok, so that’s only six minutes. But when you’re standing in the bowels of hell on a stiflingly hot subway platform, six minutes can seem like a very long time! And while it turns out the Con Ed itself never lost power, there was a system voltage dip. Which seems like something that could easily happen as more and more pressure is put on the system due to increased use of electricity because of air conditioners, which people heedlessly blast without considering that air conditioners are kind of the devil and fans are where it’s at (that’s just a personal opinion, but it is a correct one).
Anyway, welcome to summer in the city, everyone! Ha ha. Fuck this summer already. Good luck out there.
Follow Kristin Iversen on twitter @kmiversen
