National Guard and firefighters rescued hundreds people from record flooding in New Jersey on Tuesday and Vermont planned to airlift food and water to inland towns cut off by Hurricane Irene after its paralyzing rampage through the U.S. northeast.
The Passaic River in northern New Jersey crested Tuesday morning and forced mandatory evacuations.
Metro-North Railroad to and from New York City resumed full service on its major lines, while some remain indefinitely suspended.
Extensive flooding remained in parts of New Jersey on Tuesday. Passaic County in the northern part of the state and Mercer and Middlesex Counties in the central part were particularly hard-hit, with water reaching the roofs of some houses.
Two men who ventured out into the storm on Saturday night (and were subsequently reported as missing) were found dead on Monday afternoon.
Metro-North train service was partly restored on Tuesday, but several lines remained down, and the Port Jervis Line was expected to be crippled for months because of flooding from Hurricane Irene.
By Tuesday, the death toll from Irene had risen to at least 40. The sharp increase from initial reports of 25 casualties came as a number of drowned bodies were recovered and several more people electrocuted by downed power lines.
Keep in mind that since the election of John F. Kennedy, no Catholic has ascended to the White House. Neither has a woman, or a Jew, or an Asian or a Latino.
Irene ran through 10 states on the East Coast, damaging several communities, including some in New York and New Jersey, with winds and floods. It is believed that Irene claimed 25 lives as of Monday and caused between $7 billion and $13 billion in damages.
Energy firms along the Eastern Seaboard scrambled on Monday to resume operations after Hurricane Irene left 5.5 million customers without power.
After Hurricane Irene forced a massive shutdown of mass transit in New York City, subway service has been fully restored citywide, NBC New York reported.
The New York Blood Center, which serves more than 20 million people in New York City, Long Island, the Hudson Valley and New Jersey, is the first blood bank to suffer from an urgent need of blood donors because it lost an estimated 2,000 donations during the Hurricane Irene storm.
There's an axiom that says, A crisis brings out the best and the worst in the human condition. And that was certainly the case with Hurricane Irene.
Irene does damage to 1,400 cell towers, but for the most part, telecom infrastructure was left alone.
New Jersey Transit's trains remain out of service Monday until further notice, as a result of damage inflicted by Hurricane Irene.
New York City was slowly getting back to business as usual on Monday after Hurricane Irene but hundreds of thousands of people who normally travel in from the surrounding area faced a hellish commute as flooding knocked out some transit routes.
In the wake of Hurricane Irene, airlines are struggling to resume a normal schedule, particularly in New York City.
Hurricane Irene, which ravaged through 10 states on the East Coast, left countless communities from North Carolina to New Jersey damaged, flooded and sans power as photos of the aftermath emerged.
Hurricane Irene could cost U.S. state and local governments billions of dollars in damages, but funds from the federal government might ultimately cover much of this expense.
Hurricane Irene prompted a death toll of at least 25 across eight states, the Associated Press reported. States of Emergency were declared in Virginia, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Connecticut, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Maryland, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire.
President Barack Obama said Monday he is continuing to direct Hurricane Irene recovery and rebuilding efforts, as federal, state, and local officials assess damage in Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states, even as Northeast states like Vermont and New Jersey continue to get people out of harm's way of rising flood waters.
