Environment

Central Park Storm: Thunderstorm Devastated Central Park in NYC

by Scott Wu | August 19, 2009 at 09:20 am

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More than 100 trees fell and even more were damaged when a fierce thunderstorm moved over New York City on Tuesday night. The storm also knocked down powerlines and caused at least 20 neighborhoods out of power.

Time-lapse video of the New York storm on Youtube (also available in HD) by knsaber

Residents near Central Park told PIX News they have never seen so much damage in the area and believed it was indicative of a tornado.

The city parks commissioner Adrian Benepe said "Central Park has been devastated," and "it created more damage than I've seen in 30 years of working in the parks."

As work crews fanned out across the park, officials said they were still evaluating the destruction wrought by the storm, which brought wind gusts of 70 m.p.h. and dumped up to three-quarters of an inch of rain over parts of the city.

A large London Plane tree blocked the East Drive, near 95th Street. Fallen limbs and branches forced the temporary closings of the Tennis Center, between 94th and 96th Streets on the West Drive; the North Meadow ball fields; and the Conservatory Garden, at Fifth Avenue and 105th Street.

Several other parks — Riverside Park on the Upper West Side, Thomas Jefferson Park in East Harlem and Randall’s Island among them — also experienced major tree damage.

The storm lasted about 35 minutes between 9:55 pm to 10:30 pm was not a tornado. Damage was caused by strong, damaging, straight-line winds, instead of rotating columns of air tornadoes do.

The inaugural night of the seventh annual Central Park Film Festival was closed early because of the storm.

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Yuliya Talmazan

at 09:32 on August 19th, 2009

That is so sad. Vancouverites can still remember the destruction to Vancouver's Stanley Park caused by a storm back in 2006 when we lost 60% of the old, mighty trees in the park. I hope the recovery effort in NYC goes fine.