Astoria Residents Cope With Power Outage After Last Night's Storm

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - All this rain means more misery for people dealing with aftermath of Wednesday night's storms.

MORE: Summer Heat Survival Guide | Click For Con Ed's Outage Map

Some people in Queens have been without power since last night.

Davey Harrell, storm witness (credit: CBS2)

"The storm came!" said 3-year-old Davey Harrell.

"What did the storm sound like?" asked CBS2's Jenna DeAngelis.

"BOOM!" said Davey.

The loud and powerful storm left Davey and his family in the dark in their Astoria apartment.

"The lights are off," Davey said.

"Was that scary?" DeAngelis asked.

"I wasn't scared of it," he said.

"It was crazy, we came out and the manhole covers were smoking on our block and FDNY was here right away," said Astoria resident Dorothy Kadar.

She's been watching Con Edison crews work to fix the issue all morning, going in and out of manholes on 33rd Street near 31st Avenue where the intersection has been blocked off.

She, like other DeAngelis spoke to, fear how long they'll be without power and AC.

"Not great, not ideal. Not what you want on the hottest weekend of the year," Kadar said. "I'm gonna go to my dad's... I'm getting out of here."

"It's kind of stuffy," said Astoria resident Paul Halatyn.

Jeremy Friedman is among the more than 500 customers who appear to have lost power. His biggest concern is his 6-week-old son.

"It was a little scary, and now I'm dropping some food off at friends that live a block away and have power," he said.

Con Ed has been busy since rain came rushing through the area. Early Thursday morning workers were fixing wires that came down in Whitestone. That was fixed quickly, but back in Astoria?

"I hope we get power back," Friedman said. "I know there are a lot of young families on the block and a lot of older retirees as well so I hope everyone stays safe in the heat."

Con Edison says the outage is weather related, and expects to have the power back on later this afternoon so people can finally cool down.

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