At PortSide NewYork, we are now catching up on coverage of maritime Sandy story, from damage to role in recovery, with an eye to creating programs as we did about marine response to 9/11. (See http://www.portsidenewyork.org/PortSide_Maritime_9-11_exhibit.htm) I think Sandy damage to NY-NJ marine industry was much worse than indicated here. Vessels and crews survived but many piers, ops/dispatch offices and repair facilities of brownwater sector were wrecked, plus many company trucks, forklifts etc. Any one know state of damage to dry docks? Red Hook container terminal ran on generators for many weeks where 100 container-moving chassis were flooded and need replacement parts. Anyone know about about the bigger cont ports? Some of MOTBY and Staten Island Richmond Terrace marine business are still without Con Ed electric reconnection as of late Jan 2013. We are looking for maritime Sandy stories. Get in touch if you have info, photos, videos to share.

Aloha from Hawaii. Kathleen Gleaves, made some great Comments and I too have been heavily involved in Emergency Preparedness. For instance when Seattle had its earthgquake we sat at the pier in Winslow waiting for the Ok to head back to Seattle. Many time there are stormes and the power goes out and it has little to no effect on the ferries as we have Emergency Back feed power to the piers and bridges for Auto traffic. Cars and passages can walk ashore or aboard and we have lights up the dock to keep everyone safe. The deckhands simply plug in the power cords and flip the switch. The ferries play a huge part in moving people. I have seen nothing about New York, so I can't comment there, but the potential is the same.

As an emergency preparedness and business continuity planner specializing in ports, I have to say that declaring "the port 100 percent open" doesn't mean the ports are functioning at 100 percent. It shouldn't be interpreted that the maritime industry came through without impact. So much of the business activity of a port is dependent on others; vendors, suppliers, customers, shippers, truck drivers, rail, skilled workers, and many many more dependencies. If these supporting stakeholders are seriously impacted, there is a significant ripple effect on the business of the port. Just because they CAN be open for business, doesn't mean they ARE doing business. Having your physical facility up and functioning is only part of the totality of a business operation. There is just so much more to it.