Two New Jersey seaside towns, ripped apart last year by a superstorm and newly rebuilt, woke up on Friday to the aftermath of a new nightmare — a raging fire that destroyed it all again.
“I feel like I want to throw up,” famously unscripted New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said on Thursday after racing to the scene.
The Jersey shore is famous for Bruce Springsteen, crowded amusement parks and some of the most praised beaches on the US east coast. The communities depend on summer tourism.
Photo: Reuters
Hurricane Sandy tore up the coast late last year, and the communities raced to prepare for business this summer. Seaside Heights, whose damaged roller coaster became a defining image of the storm, rushed to reconstruct its boardwalk in time for a May visit by Britain’s Prince Harry. It finished with only hours to spare.
However, on Thursday, the fire that started near an ice cream shop spread to destroy 50 local businesses and caused millions of dollars in damage. It raged for eight hours and destroyed about five blocks of boardwalk.
US President Barack Obama praised the first responders who helped fight the fire and pledged support for state and local efforts to rebuild and recover again.
Paul Schneider, who owns three small boardwalk stands, was stunned.
“Everything’s gone. I can’t believe this is happening again,” said Schneider, who had to rip out damaged electrical wiring and replace sodden merchandise after Sandy.
Christie on Friday said the fire was 95 percent contained, but it could take days to extinguish “hot pockets” at the scene.
The governor said there were only minor injuries, including to three police officers who fell from a moving vehicle.
“I will not permit all the work we’ve done over the last 10 months to be diminished or destroyed by what happened last night,” Christie said.
Seaside Park officials began planning on Friday morning to rebuild their part of the boardwalk, at the southern end. Most of the boardwalk shared by the two towns was still intact.
Authorities said there was no immediate indication whether the fire was suspicious or accidental.
Seaside Park borough Councilwoman Nancy Koury said local business owners worked hard to recover from Sandy’s devastation, and “now it’s all gone.”
Firefighters continued to pour water on the hot spots of the smoking ruins on Friday.
Authorities began making tentative plans to rebuild the boardwalk.
PHISHING: The con might appear convincing, as the scam e-mails can coincide with genuine messages from Apple saying you have run out of storage For a while you have been getting messages from Apple saying “your iCloud storage is full.” They say you have exceeded your storage plan, so documents are no longer being backed up, and photos you take are not being uploaded. You have been resisting Apple’s efforts to get you to pay a minimum of ￡0.99 (US$1.33) a month for more storage, but it seems that you cannot keep putting off the inevitable: You have received an e-mail which says your iCloud account has been blocked, and your photos and videos would be deleted very soon. To keep them you need
For two decades, researchers observed members of the Ngogo chimpanzee group of Kibale National Park in Uganda spend their days eating fruits and leaves, resting, traveling and grooming in their tropical rainforest abode, but this stable community then fractured and descended into years of deadly violence. The researchers are now describing the first clearly documented example of a group of wild chimpanzees splitting into two separate factions, with one launching a series of coordinated attacks against the other. Adult males and infants were targeted, with 28 deaths. “Biting, pounding the victim with their hands, dragging them, kicking them — mostly adult males,
The Israeli military has demolished entire villages as part of its invasion of south Lebanon, rigging homes with explosives and razing them to the ground in massive remote detonations. The Guardian reviewed three videos posted by the Israeli military and on social media, which showed Israel carrying out mass detonations in the villages of Taybeh, Naqoura and Deir Seryan along the Israel-Lebanon border. Lebanese media has reported more mass detonations in other border villages, but satellite imagery was not readily available to verify these claims. The demolitions came after Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz called for the destruction of
SUPERFAN: The Japanese PM played keyboard in a Deep Purple tribute band in middle school and then switched to drums at university, she told the British rock band Legendary British rock band Deep Purple yesterday made Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s day with a brief visit to their high-profile superfan as they returned to the nation they first toured more than half a century ago. Takaichi’s reputation as an amateur drummer, and a fan of hard rock and heavy metal has been well documented, and she has referred to Deep Purple as one of her favorite bands along with the likes of Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden. “You are my god,” a giddy Takaichi said in English to Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice, presenting him with a set of made-in-Japan
RSS