April 17, 2008
Midtown Manhole Explosion at East 39th Street
A manhole exploded near 113 East 39th Street around 4:25 a.m. Five buildings were evacuated, but no injuries were reported.
The FDNY found high carbon monoxide levels near the building, and residents may be out of their homes for many hours. It's unclear what caused the explosion, but they are not uncommon. Of course, this incident took place just blocks from where a steam pipe exploded last year, killing one woman, critically injuring two people, and injuring many more.
Check out the How Stuff Works explanation on exploding manholes. Slotted manhole covers are considered safer (they "allow the gas to be released less violently, and also give an early warning to possible explosions"); in DC, utility Pepco started replacing old manhole covers with slotted ones.
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Yikes! I work in this general area and ConEd has all these big orange cones over the street that have steam shooting out of the top of them. Presumably this is to relieve pressure on whatever is going on under the street. Con Ed also has at least several liquid nitrogen canisters that have tubes extending from them to under the street. I believe this is to cool overheated underground cables. Don't know exactly what is going on in midtown, but it doesn't look good.
Whatever they're doing seems like a band-aid approach to me.
As discussed previously, the LN2 is used by Verizon to keep their conduits dry.
I thought liquid nitrogen was used for cooling:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_nitrogen
btw just because something was previously stated in a gothamist comment doesn't necessarily mean that it was true. :)
It wasn't just stated in a comment.. it was discussed and confirmed with Verzion by several sources.
http://gothamist.com/2008/01/31/nitrogen_tanks.php
Okay, I just read the article. Apparently, Verizon confirmed that only SOME of the liquid nitrogen tanks are theirs.
To whom do the rest of them belong?