The Night New York Went Dark

The great New York City blackout of July 13, 1977, happened to fall on my mother’s birthday. She was out celebrating with her boyfriend, A.J., when the power failed across much of the city. I was 13 years old and home alone at the Amalgamated Warbasse Houses in Brooklyn.

Our complex remained brightly lit because it had its own power plant.

A.J. was the chief diesel engineer for the AT&T building that supported telephone communications between North America and Europe. After the blackout began, police gave him an escort to the building so he could start its emergency generators. The officers then took my mother home.

That night, I worked with Brooklyn Area REACT. The organization maintained a base station at an NYPD Highway Two facility near the Belt Parkway and Flatbush Avenue. Because Warbasse still had electricity, I was able to relay radio traffic for REACT and the NYPD along the Belt Parkway between the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge and Flatbush Avenue.

While much of New York City was dark, a 13-year-old boy in Brooklyn sat at a radio helping messages get through. Looking back, it was one of my earliest real experiences in emergency communications—and an early glimpse of the role radio would continue to play throughout my life.

Eric WB2EHG
Brooklyn, New York USA