Only the eigth one to hit NYC since 1950
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New York hit by a TORNADO: One person ****** and a trail of destruction left as 100mph winds rip through city
At least one person has been ****** after a tornado-like storm ripped through New York.
The sky turned black and squalls tore through the city stranding ten of thousands of commuters.
Officials suspended access to overcrowded Pennsylvania Station in midtown Manhattan, where people were locked shoulder to shoulder after fallen trees ****** a halt to commuter rail traffic.
Residents in the Park Slope neighborhood in the Brooklyn borough of New York circle around a car crushed by a fallen tree
A householder looks at a tree that fell on an SUV on 11th Street between 5th and 4th Avenues in the Brooklyn borough of New York City
A man steps through fallen branches in the Park Slope neighborhood in the Brooklyn borough of New York
Staten Island, Brooklyn and Queens were hit hardest by the storm. Locals used axes to hack at trees that in some cases had crashed across stairways and front porches, trapping people inside homes.
Winds reached up to 100mph shut down roads and power lines leaving 70,000 customers without power.
The city's 911 switchboards were inundated with calls of injuries, a Fire Department spokesman said.
Several firefighters responded to scenes in Queens and Brooklyn where motorists were stuck in their vehicles after trees fell on them.
'It was like Iraq's front line,' one man told NY1, the city's all-news television station.
'It felt like the Wizard of Oz,' a woman told the station.
Other witnesses described whooshing noises, train-like rumblings and the sounds of loud cracks as lightning struck and trees snapped.
'I actually started to pray. I was very frightened,' Antonia Ritorto of Staten Island's Tottenville neighbourhood said.
'It came so quickly. The sky got so dark. The rain was sideways and the water was coming in through the windows.'
Jeanne King, of Forest Hill, said: 'It's like a war zone out here. Trees are down. Some houses have come apart.'
Police said Aline Levakis, 30, of Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, died when a tree crushed a car she was driving on the Grand Central Parkway in Queens.
It is believed she and her husband, Billy, 60, had switched seats moments before the accident.
He is today being treated at New York Hospital Queens.
Residents were awed by the power of the swift storm.
'A huge tree limb ... flew right up the street, up the hill and stopped in the middle of the air 50 feet up in this intersection and started spinning,' said Steve Carlisle, 54. 'It was like a poltergeist.'
'Then all the garbage cans went up in the air and this spinning tree hits one of them like it was a bat on a ball.'
Emergency crews worked throughout the night clearing fallen trees from train tracks at Long Island Rail Road station.
Services were disrupted between Penn Station in Manhattan and Jamaica, Queens which is a key station for passengers going to JFK airport.
Tornado warnings had been issued for Staten Island, Brooklyn and Queens.
At least 30,000 customers were without power, with Queens being the hardest hit with 27,000 homes affected.
'The good news is that most people were safe, just annoyed - traffic being bad or a tree coming down in their yard,' Mayor Michael Bloomberg said after touring storm damage in Queens.
Fire officials were inspecting 10 buildings in Brooklyn whose roofs were peeled off or tattered by the wind.
Neighbours clear fallen trees and debris off of cars on 11th Street between 5th and 4th Avenues in Brooklyn after the fierce storm
Tree limbs lies fallen against a house on 11th Street between 5th and 4th Avenues
Downed trees and other debris lie on a street in Park Slope following a late afternoon storm
'The wind was holding my ceiling up in the air. It was like a wave, it went up and fell back down,' said Ruby Ellis, 58.
'After the roof went up, then all the rain came down and I had a flood.'
Townsend Davis stood outside his Brooklyn home, where a 40-foot tree was uprooted and crushed two cars.
'I'm just glad it fell that way, as bad as I feel for the owners of that car, because if it fell this way, my house wouldn't be here,' said Davis, 47.
According to the National Weather Service, tornado warnings for Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island were called off at about 6pm.
While a tornado was never officially declared, a trained weather spotter reported seeing a funnel cloud near Staten Island.
Brandon Smith, a meteorologist with the weather service, said experts on Friday would determine if a tornado did hit by looking at debris.
'The way the damage lies on the ground can give you a lot of hints,' he said.
Kyle Struckmann, a National Weather Service meteorologist, said eight twisters have hit New York City since 1950. The last was in July, when a small one hit the Bronx during a thunderstorm that left thousands without power
'It was like the wizard of Oz': the storm is just the latest instance of weird weather to hit New York. In February the city registered its heaviest snowfall and this summer was the hottest on record
Firefighters clean fallen trees on 6th Avenue in the Brooklyn borough of New York City
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