For many in the New York City area, daybreak Tuesday brought stark realization that the damage was as great as predicted. Here are some of the stories.
In Red Hook, Brooklyn residents who ignored the mandatory evacuation awoke to debris strewn streets and a continuing blackout.
The floodwaters that rose at least 12 blocks inland had receded by dawn, leaving cars scattered like leaves on the streets, planters deposited in intersections, and green metal garbage bins flipped on their sides.
The doors of the Fairway grocery store were blown out.
"Oh Jesus, oh no," said Faye Schwartz, 65, as she surveyed the damage shortly after 7 a.m.
Schwartz and her husband rode out the storm on the third floor of the residences above the Fairway, and said white-capped flood waters reached at least three feet around the building.
"It was scary how fast the water came up," she said.
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Kelvin Redmond, an accountant and associate minister at the Shiloh Baptist Church in Rockville Centre on Long Island, lives two blocks from the water in a three-story split level, but hadn't been able to get back to check on damage because the streets were still impassable. When he saw Monday morning's high tide, he said: "I knew then that it would be bad."
He spoke on Guy Lombardo Avenue in Freeport. About 100 feet away, a small boat sat in the street.
