The United States of America is yet to come back to normalcy four days after Hurricane Sandy slammed into the eastern part of the country, killing more than 90 people, leaving millions of people without power and damaging hundreds of houses and property.
The monster storm, which was one of the biggest to hit the United States, killed 98 people, with 40 of them from New York City, reported Reuters.
[AFTERMATH HURRICANE SANDY PHOTOS]
Public schools in New York City will be reopened on Monday but many students will be relocated to other schools as the monster storm damaged many buildings. Dennis M. Walcott, chancellor of Education Department, told reporters that 44 buildings housing 79 schools were damaged.
POWER CRISIS
New Yorkers could end up staying without power for a couple of weeks more as power companies are taking time to restore all the damages done by Hurrican Sandy. Consolidated Edison said in a press release on Thursday that power would be restored for most of its customers by November 11 but could take more time for some.
ECONOMIC LOSS
Disaster modeling company Eqecat has said that the estimated total economic loss inflicted by Hurricane Sandy could be $30 to $50 billion, out of which $10 to $20 billion are insured losses. However, AIR Worldwide projected insured losses from Sandy at $7 billion to $15 billion.
"If the storm tops $8 billion in insured losses that will make Sandy the fifth largest hurricane in U.S. history," Reuters quoted Allstate Corp Chairman and Chief Executive Tom Wilson as saying.
However governors of New York and New Jersey and other U.S. states said insurance companies should not charge hurricane deductibles on damage claims because Sandy was a "post-tropical storm" by the time it hit land and wreaked havoc. That would save individual homeowners at least thousands of dollars each in out-of-pocket costs, reported Reuters.
Some economists are of the opinion that the storm could reduce the nation's economic growth in the current quarter by a half percentage point.
GAS CRISIS
It is reported that New York is gripped by gas shortage, disrupting rescue operations in many places that suffer power outage. The long lines of cars waiting for gas show the grim situation in the region.
"I've been pumping gas for 36 hours, I pumped 17,000 gallons," Abhishek Soni, the owner of an Exxon in Montclair, where disputes on the line Wednesday night had become so heated that Mr. Soni called the police and turned off the pumps for 45 minutes to restore calm, told the New York Times. "My nose, my mouth is bleeding from the fumes. The fighting just makes it worse."
The Taxi Commission has said that the number of yellow cabs in operation could be reduced drastically on Friday dure to gas shortage.
According to figures from AAA, of the gas stations it monitors, roughly 60 percent of stations in New Jersey and 70 percent on Long Island were closed, reported New York Times.
The New York region is facing gas shortage as ports and refineries in the region were shot down in view of the storm and were damaged. As if that's not enough, many gas stations were left without power.
Hurricane Sandy slammed into the eastern United States on Tuesday, flooding the New York's subway system, submerging Manhattan streets and cutting off power. Millions of people suffered power outage due to the storm.
(With Inputs from Reuters)
