Storm surge flooded basements holding fuel tanks and pumps at two Manhattan hospitals whose generators sat on upper floors. Both hospitals evacuated.
Sources checked when written 26 September 2026
TierFlooding reached the fuel systems for the backup generators; NYU Langone evacuated about 300 patients and Bellevue more than 700. How tiers are assigned.
What happened
NYU Langone's generators were on upper floors, but the surge breached a basement vault holding its fuel system; the hospital evacuated about 300 patients, including 21 neonates moved out of the NICU in 4.5 hours. Bellevue's generators were also high up, but fuel pumps and tanks were in a basement that took an estimated 17 million gallons of water; AP reported more than 700 patients evacuated.
HHS OIG's review of 172 hospitals in the declared area found 69 lost utility power and, for 28 of them, backup generators were not reliable. It describes one hospital (photo credited to NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation) where staff passed fuel up 13 flights of stairs in a 'bucket line' because the pumps were flooded, and where staff decided in advance which machine-dependent patients would keep the few emergency outlets.[1,2,3]
Documented harm
No patient deaths attributed to these evacuations in the sources reviewed. OIG documents patients arriving at receiving hospitals without medical records.
What it teaches
A generator is only as flood-proof as its lowest fuel pump, tank or switch.
Evacuating ventilated and neonatal patients without power or elevators takes hours and must be rehearsed.
Records must move with the patient; power loss can make them unreachable.
At tier 3, the exit is often evacuation, so rehearse it.
Records must travel with the patient on paper or portable media when networks are gone.
Regional coordination and transport capacity decide how fast you can move patients.
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