(Mark Your Calendars: RealShare New Jersey 2011, September 13 in New Brunswick. RealShare New York takes place Oct. 12 at the Marriott Marquis.)
NEW YORK CITY-Standing outside St. Luke’s Baptist Church in Laurelton, Queens on Thursday morning, Mayor Michael Bloomberg warned New Yorkers to “prepare for the worst” as Hurricane Irene moves up the Northeast coastline. “The city has already seen the power of Mother Nature once this week, and Mother Nature may not be done yet,” Bloomberg said at a press conference, just three days after New Yorkers were rattled by the aftershocks from a 5.9-magnitude earthquake in Virginia. A State of Emergency for New York and New Jersey has been declared.
The National Weather Service is predicting the Category 3 hurricane will hit coastal North Carolina on Saturday, which can cause high winds, heavy rain, power outages and urban flooding in the New York-metropolitan area as early as Saturday evening. “By the time Irene gets to us, it certainly will still be a powerful storm,” Bloomberg said. Forecasters are predicting a Category 2 storm for Eastern Long Island, but the fate of the five boroughs is uncertain. “At this point, the forecast does not indicate that the storm would hit New York City with that strength, but we certainly will still see its effects here,” he added.
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As a result, the New York Chapter of the Building Owners and Managers Association has been advising its members to follow its emergency management plan in case of severe weather. “It’s amazing because a few minutes before the actual earthquake took place, we've been in conference with the Office of Emergency Management discussing the storm that’s approaching this weekend,” said Lou Trimboli, chair of BOMA NY’s preparedness committee, in an interview with GlobeSt.com earlier in the week.
In a worst case scenario, Bloomberg said city residents in low-lying, coastal areas such as Coney Island and Manhattan Beach in Brooklyn, Far Rockaway and Broad Channel in Queens, and Midland Beach and other parts of Staten Island would possibly be evacuated.
In preparation for the storm, the city’s Departments of Transportation and Environmental Protection are deploying crews to 26 designated flood locations to clear debris from the city’s 143,000 catch basins. In addition, the New York City Police Department is positioning 50 small boats at station houses in low-lying areas in case of severe flooding.
“The heads of all the city’s emergency-response agencies, including the NYPD, FDNY, OEM, Transportation, Health and Buildings, are taking steps to ensure that we have the right staff and resources for any contingency,” Bloomberg said.
At the World Trade Center site, a spokesman for Silverstein Properties tells GlobeSt.com in an e-mail that its construction and engineering team at 4 World Trade Center are doing additional inspections of its cocoon, hoists and tower cranes to ensure all is secured properly. The team is also inspecting the tower’s perimeter netting to ensure that all floors are totally free of debris and battening down any items that have a potential to be wind-driven.
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