Most people wouldn’t complain about seeing blue skies, but when its 9 PM at night in New York, it comes as a bit of a shock. It turned out there had been a fire at the Con Edison power plant in Queens, which led to a huge explosion and a dramatic, bright neon-blue sky.

Some Manhattan residents thought aliens had finally come to rescue us and many rushed out with their phones and cameras to capture the unusual scene. Power outages caused problems in the subway service and a brief grounding at LaGuardia Airport.

The sky turns blue at night

Social media was alive with posts of images and video clips of the blue skyline, which many residents said turned New York City as “bright as day.” The video included below shows the light flickering in the sky for a number of minutes.

The New York Police Department later confirmed officially on Twitter that an explosion had caused the unusual sight. They even added there was currently “no evidence of extraterrestrial activity.” The NYPD did advise residents to avoid the area and later came back to confirm no one had been injured in the incident.

The New York Fire Department also advised they had responded to multiple reports of explosions in the Astoria and Long Island City area. However by 10:15 PM they were able to report that everything was under control.

Con Edison also headed to Twitter to explain there had been an electrical fire at their Astoria substation, involving some of the electrical transformers.

They added this had caused an explosion and a dip in transmission in the area and that they were investigating the cause.

Residents capture the unusual sight

The Guardian quotes Lucas Espinoza, who lives in Queens, as saying he was eating dinner when the lights and TV suddenly starting flickering.

He said the next moment the sky, which had been black moments before, was lit by a “pulsating greenish blue light.” Espinoza said he immediately ran up to the roof to take video footage and that the incident lasted a few minutes.

George Delis, a resident in the area close to the plant, told the newspaper that his TV had gone out and he had suddenly seen this “massive bright light.” Delis said he believed it was a UFO, because it was so bright and that he got excited that he grabbed his phone.

He then found out a transformer was on fire at Con Edison. Delis said in the 37 years he had been living there, he had never seen anything quite like it. Jennifer Enriquez can be heard on the video, exclaiming that she was so happy she had caught the whole thing on video.

Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York, later confirmed that the unusual light had been caused by an electrical surge at the Con Edison substation and said there were no injuries and no further fire. De Blasio confirmed that the MTA (subway) now had power, but warned that there were currently delays on the 7 train.

Meanwhile, the airport also warned people who were flying out to check the status of their flight as while many flights were departing, others were not due to the incident. As reported by ITV News, LaGuardia’s power had mostly been restored by 11 PM and normal operations were resuming.
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