Con Ed shows off resiliency efforts 10 years after Superstorm Sandy
NEW YORK - Nearly 10 years ago, Superstorm Sandy knocked out power to most of Manhattan below 36th street.
Since then, Con Edison has done a lot of work to ensure the next storm that strikes cannot do the same. CBS2s Vanessa Murdock got a first-hand look at the work done to shore up the East 13th Street Substation, where the water was 14 feet above sea level.
"Our new shoreline was Avenue B. We are at Avenue D," said Con Ed General Manager Aisha Ahmad.
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"We anticipated significant impact ahead of Sandy," Cawley said. "It exceeded our expectations."
Surveillance video captured during the storm shows an almost blinding flash of light coming from the East 13th Street substation. The video is impressive, the imagery unforgettable for many, but it was not that flash and substation failure that caused the power to go out. Flooding at the substation and at two others in the city left more than 220,000 customers in the dark.
Within five days, Con Ed restored power to the island. Then, the much larger job of fortifying the grid against future storms and climate change began.
"We made a $1 billion investment commitment to strengthen our systems," Cawley said.
One hundred and eighty million went to the substation.
Ahmad led the tour and showed Murdock the first line of defense – the perimeter wall. Before Sandy, it was chainlink with some concrete.
"We made it solid and we went down into the ground as well," Ahmad said.
Water proof shower curtains hang at entry points. All equipment now sits well above solid ground, including the pass breakers added post-Sandy to boost reliability. Fiberoptic lines that don't short in salt water replaced old copper ones.
"Earlier we were at ground level. Now we're two flights above, which is the new control room," Ahmad said.
Floodwaters three feet deep cut off incoming information and trapped 11 workers inside.
"It was a surreal scene over here," Con Ed worker Benny Varughese said.
Along with Rescue 1, Varughese helped get them all to safety.
Beyond the substation, Con Ed installed stronger poles and wires, added more smart switches.
To reduce response and recovery time for repairs, Con Ed now has 100 bucket trucks on standby in Pomona, New York for out-of-state crews.
"We fly them right in, they get here quickly, and they just hop in these bucket trucks that are there for their use," Cawley said.
Big moves toward building a more resilient, reliable power supply.
Superstorm Sandy and the Nor'easter that hit a week later led to more than one million outages – the most destructive set of storms in company history.