Nor’easter kills Brooklyn housing worker and floods Northeast communities

A powerful nor’easter killed one person with a falling tree in Brooklyn and caused widespread flooding and power outages across the Northeast on Saturday.

The victim was Leighton Brown, 56, a New York City Housing Authority employee. He was walking through east Brooklyn working an extra shift when the tree fell. “We mourn deeply for the loss of Leighton Brown, a NYCHA employee who faithfully served Brooklyn residents and who was known for his warm personality,” the Office of the NYC Public Advocate wrote on social media.

Coastal flooding and states of emergency

States of emergency were declared in New York and New Jersey as the storm swamped coastal communities. Streets and homes were inundated with floodwater in the New Jersey towns of Surf City and Manasquan on Saturday, and the Howard Beach neighbourhood of Queens was also under water. More than 10cm of rain had fallen since Friday in some spots in New Jersey, and residents said the flooding was not seen for close to a decade in places accustomed to high water. NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani warned residents not to travel and not to drive or walk through floodwater. The National Weather Service urged people to prepare immediately for significant inundation in low-lying areas near the shore, including roads underwater and impacts to homes and businesses. A full moon was projected to worsen coastal flooding.

Wind gusts toppled trees on Long Island, damaging homes and bringing down utility poles. Bob Oravec, a lead forecaster with the NWS in College Park, Maryland, said tidal flooding would stay through high-tide cycles Sunday night.

Power outages and travel chaos

More than 160,000 households were without electricity, nearly all in the Northeast, according to the tracker PowerOutage. Separately, more than 100,000 customers were without power across the Northeast and mid-Atlantic at times on Sunday, according to PowerOutage.us. The most widespread outages were in counties along the coast from New Jersey to Connecticut. The figures may reflect different time points or units, as one tracker counts households and the other counts customers.

More than 2,400 flights were delayed and 1,199 grounded on Saturday, according to FlightAware. At Boston Logan International Airport, more than 250 flights were cancelled by late Sunday morning as wind gusts reached 64km/h, according to the Massachusetts Port Authority. FlightAware separately reported more than 300 flights in and out of Boston cancelled on Sunday, about a quarter of the day’s schedule. At LaGuardia, more than 660 flights were delayed on Sunday, about 60%, as the FAA slowed operations due to high wind. Airlines kept most schedules intact, and cancellations were far fewer than during other major storms. American, United, Delta and JetBlue offered fee-free changes for flights before the middle of the week. The weekend disruptions followed an equipment outage on Monday that forced carriers to cancel hundreds of flights bound for the New York area and Philadelphia.

Events cancelled as storm lingers

The Global Citizen Festival in Central Park, headlined by Lauryn Hill, Wyclef Jean and John Legend, was cancelled. Ed Sheeran’s concert at Gillette Stadium in the Boston area was also called off for safety. The Red Sox moved their game against the Chicago Cubs to Sunday afternoon in Florida, and a football match between Red Bull New York and St Louis City SC was cancelled.

The storm was expected to linger through Sunday, with heavy rain, strong winds and dangerous surf extending to New England. The worst remaining rainfall was expected Sunday from northern New Jersey into southern New England. The storm triggered memories of Hurricane Sandy, which left more than $60bn in damage across the eastern US in 2012. It could be the first of several along the East Coast this fall because of an El Nino climate pattern disrupting this year’s weather.