Sewage, Bacteria, Gasoline Found in NYC Floodwater

Credit: ABC News

Water is everywhere in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy ' in basements, on the streets and in transit systems ' but the one place that flood water is most dangerous is in your body.

ABC News chief health and medical editor Dr. Richard Besser collected floodwater and drinking water in some of the areas hit hardest by Sandy and had them tested at The Ambient Group lab. The floodwater collected in Lower Manhattan tested positive for gasoline and two types of bacteria found in sewage: E. coli and coliform.

'Very dangerous,' Besser said. 'Make sure you wear protective gear if you are coming into contact with flood water.'

Looking at the testing containers filled with Manhattan floodwater, Besser explained that the yellow glow indicated that coliform bacteria was present at high levels.  The purple fluorescence tells us that there are sky-high levels of  E. coli from sewage contamination.

Today, he went to Piermont, N.Y., an area hit so hard by the hurricane that it's under a boil water advisory, meaning residents are instructed not to drink tap water without first boiling it or purifying it with bleach.

Click here to read Dr. Besser's 'Tips to Make Tap Water Safe for Drinking.

When a power outage knocked out one of Piermont's water pumps, officials were concerned about tap water contamination. The water company tested water from a hydrant, which initially ran brown, but eventually cleared.

Besser tested the hydrant water as well, and smelt chlorine in it, which helps protect it from bacteria.

He also collected tap water from a family's home faucet and expects to review the lab results tomorrow which will indicate whether the family's water was contaminated.  Several families in the neighborhood are already boiling their water as a precaution.

Anyone in a flood-affected area should listen for alerts. While water companies are responsible for alerting residents whether their water is unsafe to drink, city officials also alert the community.

Click here for a list of areas under boil water advisory.

New York City, for instance, the Department of Environmental protection announced today that its water is safe to drink. Water in reservoirs 125 miles north of the city continue to be monitored closely with extra testing in the wake of the storm.

If you rely on well water and were in a flooded area, you  should assume your water is contaminated until it can be tested. Follow the 'boil water' advisories and boil your water for a full minute before using.

Obama, Christie Tour Sandy's Devastation

President Barack Obama, center, and Federal Emergency Management (FEMA) administrator Craig Fugate, left, watch as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, second from left, meets with local residents at Brigantine Beach Community Center, Oct. 31, 2012, in Brigantine, NJ. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP Photo)

President Obama surveyed the devastation wreaked by the superstorm Sandy today with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in what both men said was a non-political event. But it was a powerful image of bipartisan cooperation just six days before the election.

Following a helicopter tour of the state's battered shoreline, Obama expressed his sympathies and promised the full weight of his office and the federal government in providing aid.

"We are here for you, and we will not forget," Obama said. "We will follow up to make sure you get all the help you need until you rebuild.

"I don't want anybody to feel that somehow this is all going to get cleaned up overnight," Obama said. "But what I can promise you is that the federal government will be working as closely as possible with the state and local officials, and we will not quit until this is done."

Obama was accompanied on the tour by Christie, a vocal supporter of Obama's challenger, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. However, Christie has praised the president for his oversight of federal emergency efforts.

Jersey Bromance: President Obama and Chris Christie Survey Storm Damage

Christie again thanked the president today, saying the two men had a "great working relationship" and that the president "sprung into action immediately."

Although it was not a political statement, Christie's comments were an unlikely endorsement of the president's leadership at crucial juncture in the presidential race.

Together, the two men cut a surprising image of bipartisanship and cooperation ahead of next week's vote, as polls show the race in a dead heat nationally.

President Barack Obama, center, and Federal Emergency Management (FEMA) administrator Craig Fugate, left, watch as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, second from left, meets with local residents at Brigantine Beach Community Center, Oct. 31, 2012, in Brigantine, NJ.

New polls in three key swing states show Obama holding his lead in Ohio and wiping away Romney's advantages in Virginia and Florida.

Obama leads 49 percent to 47 percent in Virginia and had a 48 percent to 47 percent edge in Florida, according to the Quinnipiac University/New York Times/CBS News poll.

Obama's leads in those two states were within the margin of error, meaning the candidates were essentially tied. But Romney was leading in those states just a few days ago in other polls.

In Ohio, Obama is maintaining a five-point lead, with a 50-45 margin, according to Quinnipiac.

In a new video today, Obama campaign manager Jim Messina said he thinks Obama is in the dominant position heading into Election Day because, "We are ahead or tied in every single battleground state."

(For more politics coverage check out abcnews.com/politics or, for lighter take, otusnews.com)

The Romney campaign disputed the results of the Quinnipiac survey, claiming it overestimated the size of the Democratic turnout.

Ohio, Virginia and Florida are among the most vital of the battleground states for both campaigns.

The Quinnipiac survey was the first major poll of the swing states released since superstorm Sandy made landfall in Atlantic City, N.J., Monday evening, wreaking billions of dollars in damage and delivering an October surprise that no pundit predicted. The polling, however, was done before Sandy arrived and may have altered voter attitudes towards the candidates.

Romney today went back to a day of full campaigning after a brief respite out of respect to the storm victims, and his campaign hoped that the momentum generated in the days before Sandy would hold through Election Day.

He was to attend two "victory rallies" in Florida today with a number of high-profile conservatives, including former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and Sen. Marco Rubio.

Obama was to return to campaigning Thursday with events in Green Bay, Wis., Las Vegas and Boulder, Colo.

Meanwhile, Romney and conservative Super PACs were spending big in the Democratic-leaning states of Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

Republicans said Romney's slim lead in nationwide polls gave them the opportunity to go after Obama in blue-leaning states, which the president did not yet have fully locked up. The Democrats, however, said Republicans were spending money in blue-leaning states because the swing states were already saturated with political ads, and buying new ads would be prohibitively expensive for outside groups.

Americans Slip From Minnesota to Somali Terror Group: FBI

Young American men continue to slip through a terrorist recruiting pipeline from the homeland to join the ranks of jihadists half a world away in East Africa, with two going as recently as three months ago, according to federal officials.

The FBI confirmed a report by Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) that in July two young men disappeared from their neighborhoods in Minneapolis and are believed to have traveled to Somalia to join al-Shabaab, the embattled al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group.

Under "Operation Rhino," for years the FBI has been investigating what has been described as a recruiting pipeline from the Twin Cities, which boast large Somali immigrant populations, to Somalia. Both top U.S. officials and at least one prominent member of al-Shabaab said Americans account for dozens of the terror group's fighters. A 2011 Congressional report put the number around 40.

"Minnesota represented!" writes American-born rapping jihadist Omar Hammami in an autobiography posted online in May, though he claimed most of the U.S. recruits were already dead. "Those Minnesota brother[s] have almost all left their mark on the [jihad] and most have received martyrdom, while the rest are still waiting."

Kyle Loven, chief division counsel for the FBI's Minneapolis field office, said recruits going to Somalia from Minnesota "continues to be a matter of grave concern and the FBI remains fully committed to resolving this situation."

The FBI said that in the recent case, two young Minnesota men, 19-year-old Mohamed Osman and 20-year-old Omar Ali Farah, left their homes for their trek to Somalia in mid-July. Osman's family told MPR he was religious, but they were stunned when he disappeared.

"It made me mad because he didn't speak to no relative about it," Osman's cousin, Jamal Salim, said. "We're heartbroken about it because he's like our sibling. Imagine not knowing what's going on with your own brother -- how he's been feeling, who he's been talking to, and what they're telling him. We lost a brother, and I don't know how to get him back."

Earlier this month some details about how exactly young men are recruited for jihad emerged during the federal trial of a man who was convicted of recruiting more than 20 fighters for al-Shabaab in America in 2007, according to The Associated Press.

At the trial of Mahamud Said Omar, three former recruits who had survived their trip to Somalia only to return to the U.S. testified that they were talked into fighting by charismatic, devout older men who promised paradise for those who died in combat against "invaders."

READ: Minnesota Trial Opens Window on Somalia Terror Group

Al-Shabaab has suffered several recent defeats at the hands of African military forces and lost its final urban stronghold in Somalia earlier this month. But Western and Somali security experts told ABC News they are concerned such defeats may tempt the terror group into abandoning insurgency in Somalia for a renewed focus on international terrorism.

An African Union official said there is worry that the same fighters driven out of Somalia could launch attacks abroad, from Kenya and Uganda to the U.S.

During Congressional testimony in January, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper listed al-Shabaab as one of the most significant terror threats to the homeland, in part due to a "foreign fighter cadre that includes U.S. passport holders... [who] may have aspirations to attack inside the United States."

READ: Intel Head James Clapper on Greatest Threats in 2012

U.S. Special Representative for Somalia James Swan told reporters last month that al-Shabaab's recent loses caused some of the terror group's foreign fighters to flee, but Swan did not know if that meant they were abandoning jihad or simply heading to a different al Qaeda-affiliated group in another country such as Yemen.

ABC News' Rym Momtaz contributed to this report.

NY Gov. Worries About Future Storms

Gov. Andrew Cuomo with Diane Sawyer. Image: ABC News.

ABC News' Eric Noll reports:

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo described the scene in Lower Manhattan and at the World Trade Center Memorial Monday night as 'frightening,' but said today that things were looking much better and that the city would quickly come back from Hurricane Sandy.

'It was all dark because [Con Edison] had turned off the power. And the water. The Hudson River was just a few hundred yards to the right from us. It had come over the banks. ' And was filling this site [at the World Trade Center Memorial] at such a rate and from every direction,' he said today. 'You were just wondering when it was going to stop. ' We could not have taken much more of the flow that we were getting last night.'

Cuomo said officials feared for the memorial, its underground museum and the city's other underground infrastructure such as its subway tunnels. He said that at one point Monday night, they even wondered whether the rushing waters would collapse the entire World Trade Center site.

'The way New York was designed, we're not in a part of the country that deals with floods or [is] designed to deal with floods,' he said. 'We have a lot of infrastructure under the ground that gets filled up. The subway tunnels have all flooded. Some of the subway stations, the water is up to the ceiling.'

Cuomo said officials did not know when the power would be completely restored. He said the subway tunnels would have to be pumped first because much of Con Edison's equipment was located there. He estimated that would take a couple of days.

The New York governor told ABC News that he agreed with former Vice President Al Gore, who  said in a blog post earlier today that Hurricane Sandy was a symptom of a larger climate crisis

'I believe he's right,' Cuomo said. 'I said kiddingly the other day, 'We have a 100-year flood every two years now.' These situations never happened or if they happened, they were never going to happen again. ' I think at this point it's undeniable that we have a higher frequency of these extreme weather situations, and we're going to have to deal with it.'

 

 

Fires Rage in New Jersey Shore Town

A New Jersey shore town that suffered severe damage during superstorm Sandy is fighting a huge fire this morning after an apparent gas-main explosion.

The cut-off barrier island of Mantoloking, N.J., was beset by a large cluster of flames and smaller fires that quickly spread across the island, WABC-TV reported.

Video shows several structures burned to the ground. The exact size of the fire is unclear.

Authorities believe a gas main might have exploded and quickly spread across the island, WABC reported. The small town of Mantoloking sits between the Atlantic Ocean and the Barnegat Bay.

There were no firefighters at the scene because they were unable to cross the storm-damaged roads at the Mantoloking Bridge, the fire department in Bricktown, N.J., confirmed to ABC News.

Fire officials said they are figuring out how to get to the scene this morning.

Several homes were destroyed and continued to burn, but it is unclear whether the homes were destroyed by the fire or explosion, or before it, WABC reported.

Sandy destroyed about 14 homes in the town, according to The Associated Press.

Christie Vows NJ, After 'Unfathomable' Damage, Will Rebuild

Residents along the East Coast are beginning to pick up the pieces after the deadly superstorm Sandy devastated the most densely populated region in the country, with New Jersey experiencing "unthinkable" damage to its coastline as homes were swept from their foundations and amusement park rides were washed into the ocean.

President Obama will arrive in New Jersey this afternoon to survey the damage with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. President Obama declared parts of New Jersey, along with parts of New York, a major disaster area, which would allow federal funding for storm-related repairs.

More than eight million people are still without power across 17 states and Sandy is now being blamed for at least 51 deaths in the U.S. and two people missing, according to The Associated Press.

Hurricane Sandy: Full Coverage

Hundreds of thousands of people who had to evacuate their homes are left wondering what ' if anything ' was left. For those residents living on the New Jersey coastline, Christie described the damage as "unfathomable" and "unthinkable."

"The boardwalk we walked on together this summer greeting residents, talking to those business owners, it's gone," Christie said at a Tuesday evening press conference after surveying the damage.

Images from around the storm-affected areas depicted scenes reminiscent of big-budget disaster movies. In Atlantic City, N.J., a gaping hole remained where once a stretch of boardwalk sat by the sea.

"It won't be same. It will be different because many of the iconic things that made it what it was are not gone and washed into the ocean," Christie said.

Christie said that he plans on speaking to Obama about getting Army Corps of Engineers into the state to begin rebuilding as soon as possible, especially the Jersey Shore.

"As a kid who was born and raised in this state and who spent a lot of time over my life, both my childhood and my adult life, at the Jersey Shore. We'll rebuild it. No question in my mind we'll rebuild it."

Seaside Heights, a city synonymous with fun, is now submerged underwater with destruction as far as the eye can see. Homes, cars and amusement park rides litter the coastline and the ocean. Timothy Husar took a picture of the submerged rollercoaster in Seaside Park that went viral on social media.

"When the tide gets really high, it's completely underwater," Husar said.

Husar said that the high tides and strong winds also pushed debris from other coastline cities toward Seaside.

"Throughout the ocean you see the northerly or southerly winds pushing debris that we suspect is from Atlantic City and the Wildwood area up towards our docks," he said.

Boat rescues continued along the storm-ravaged shore Tuesday night for those residents who did not heed the warnings and mandatory evacuation orders.

With chest pains, Tom Moriarty was taken to Atlantic City's hospital. His daughter remains at his flooded home in Brigantine, N.J.

"She said everything was fine and that if worse comes to worse, she and her boyfriend, were going to go into the attic," Moriarty said.

The number of power outages topped 1.9 million customers in New Jersey and half a million in New York City, and approached another million on New York's Long Island.

Nearly 4,000 utility workers from all areas of the country are rushing to New York to help turn on the power after much of lower Manhattan plunged into darkness and dimmed the famous skyline.

"You should not expect the vast bulk of those people that do not have service today to get service much before the weekend," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said during a Tuesday press conference.

All bridges and tunnels have reopened with the Holland Tunnel and Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel the only exceptions. Officials hoped to have power restored to New York in two to three days and aim to have the subways running by the weekend, Bloomberg said.

Faced with the chance of not having power for days, looting has become a problem in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn, N.Y., Tuesday night.

More than 100 police officers stood on corners or cruised in cars to guard a strip of vandalized stores and a damaged bank, to the relief of shaken residents.

"We're feeling OK, but at first we felt worried," 12-year-old Oleg Kharitmov told the AP as he walked his dog with his parents by the bank. "I'm pretty happy that the cops are here."

Massive Losses Likely From Hurricane Sandy

Morning Business Memo

The multi-billion dollar insurance losses from Hurricane Sandy could be larger than anyone expected before the massive storm blew ashore. It may take weeks to assess the damage from widespread flooding and destruction in the east. More than ten states have been directly affected. The National Flood Insurance Program will step in to pay for some of the damage. Preliminary estimates are that Sandy will be a lot more expensive than last year's Hurricane Irene, which according to one finding cost nearly $16 billion. The worst damage came from Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It cost $108 billion and caused 1,200 deaths.

Stock trading is closed for a second straight day. Bond trading will also be closed. It is the first time since 1888 that the exchange will have been closed for two consecutive days because of weather.

Transportation is at a standstill in the Northeast. Airlines grounded thousands more flights today, stranding travelers as far away as Europe and Asia. Amtrak says it's canceled all service today in the Northeast because of high winds and heavy rains. Cargo container operations were suspended in the normally busy ports of New York and northern New Jersey.

Many large companies have postponed the release of their quarterly earnings reports. Before the approach of Hurricane Sandy the Conference Board delayed the release of its October Consumer Confidence survey. The Labor Department says it still plans to release the monthly jobs survey on Friday. That will be the last employment report before next week's election.

Japanese cars are still the most reliable brands on the road, according to Consumer Reports. Toyota's Scion, Lexus and Toyota brands took the top three spots and the Toyota Prius C, a subcompact hybrid, got the best overall score in the magazine's annual reliability survey. Mazda, Subaru, Honda and Acura were close behind. The rankings attempt to predict the reliability of 2013 model-year vehicles based on surveys of Consumer Reports' readers. This year, 800,000 people submitted information on 1.2 million vehicles from the 2010 to 2012 model years.

The rankings are important for auto companies, since Americans frequently cite Consumer Reports as a main source of car-buying advice. Ford and Lincoln, once top performers, plummeted to the bottom of this year's rankings because of persistent problems with touch screens and bumpy transmissions. Ford was also hurt because three normally reliable models ' the Ford Escape, Ford Fusion and Lincoln MKZ ' are all new for 2013, so Consumer Reports couldn't predict their reliability. Also near the bottom were Chrysler Group's Chrysler, Dodge and Ram brands, which have been getting a fast makeover since partnering with Italy's Fiat three years ago. Consumer Reports says models with more features and more powerful engines, like the V-8 versions of the Chrysler 300 and Jeep Grand Cherokee ' had the most issues. The best-performing U.S. brand was Cadillac, from General Motors.

Richard Davies Business Correspondent ABC NEWS Radio ABCNews.com twitter.com/daviesabc