A Look at How the Storm Affected New York City Here is a look at how the behemoth storm Sandy affected the nation's largest city and its suburbs. A day after the storm hit, New Yorkers were coping with flooding in some areas, digging out from the mucky leftovers of receding waters in others and bracing for days without power. With power out to more than 750,000 New Yorkers, much of the nation's financial capital was dark Tuesday. Some narrow streets in the neighborhoods of lower Manhattan were flooded, as were some subway stations. The New York Stock Exchange was closed for the second day but planned to reopen Wednesday. Five cars piled on top of each other floated in a flooded loading dock in the Financial District. People stopped to gawk and take pictures. The streets were littered with debris, uprooted trees and glass from broken windows. The storm had shattered the 8-foot-tall panes of glass of one building. At a darkened luxury high-rise building called the William Beaver House, resident manager John Sarich was sending porters with flashlights up and down the 47 flights of stairs to check on residents. He said most of the residents had stayed put despite calls to evacuate lower Manhattan. One pregnant woman in the building started having contractions Monday night. Sarich said that before the power went out, he nervously researched on the Internet how to deliver a baby. Cars are submerged at the entrance to a parking garage in New York's Financial District in the aftermath of superstorm Sandy, Tuesday, Oct. 30, 2012. New York City awakened Tuesday to a flooded subway system, shuttered financial markets and hundreds of thousands of people without power a day after a wall of seawater and high winds slammed into the city, destroying buildings and flooding tunnels. "I said, 'Oh, boy, I'm in trouble,'" Sarich recalled. The woman, however, found a cab to take her to a hospital. A huge fire destroyed 80 to 100 houses in a flooded beachfront neighborhood on Tuesday, injuring three people and forcing firefighters to undertake daring rescues. More than 190 firefighters contained the blaze but were still putting out some pockets of fire more than nine hours after it erupted. As daylight broke, neighbors walked around aimlessly through their smoke-filled neighborhood, which sits on the Rockaway peninsula jutting into the Atlantic Ocean. Electrical wires dangled within feet of the street. Officials said the fire was reported around 11 p.m. Monday in an area flooded by the superstorm. Video footage of the scene showed a swath of tightly packed homes engulfed in orange flames as firefighters hauled hoses while sloshing in ankle-high water. Many homes appeared flattened by the wind-whipped flames. Allison Miller stood on what was left of the buckled boardwalk in tears. She said two family beach homes were destroyed by the fire as well. "My house is gone," she said. John Frawley said he, too, made a mistake by staying behind. "I stayed up all night," he said. The screams. The fire. It was horrifying. A strong gust of wind during superstorm Sandy likely was a major factor in damaging a giant construction crane at a luxury Manhattan high-rise, city officials said Tuesday. The rig's arm dangled precariously and forced evacuations in the thick of the storm. Department of Buildings chief spokesman Tony Sclafani said the investigation into what happened is just starting but engineers believe wind gusts estimated at 80 to 100 mph played a big role. Investigators also will look at how the crane was positioned and other issues.