As New York City continues to wilt its way through a stifling heat wave, it's appropriate to remember that things could be worse: 13 years ago today, a massive 30-hour blackout began, thanks to an overgrown tree branch in Cleveland. The blackout heavily impacted eight states in the Northeast and Ontario.



Grand Central Terminal on August 14, 2003(Getty Images)

Today in 2003, the Northeastern United States and Canada went into darkness. Do you remember the Blackout of 2003? pic.twitter.com/zKAY6khtDH — OHA (@OnondagaHisAssn) August 14, 2016

In the Big Apple, stoplights failed and New Yorkers took matters into their own hands and directed traffic. Many had to trudge down the stairwells of their office skyscrapers, and head home—if they had a way of getting home, that is.



People without hotel rooms in Midtown (Getty Images)

Or they just had a really great day, getting cheap or free food and drinks. Many restaurants decided to have impromptu parties, rather than let the food rot in their refrigerators.



August 14, 2003 (Getty Images)

Many people piled into buses, but many trapped underground weren't so lucky. Think about being trapped in a subway! There were 413 subway train sets stopped with 400,000 passengers that had to be evacuated, a process that took almost three hours. A federal report noted, "Unfortunately, the passengers flowing into the streets from underground met a massive amount of congestion in the streets and on the sidewalks due to the volume of vehicles and pedestrians."

Now, the memory is being used as a punchline for 2016 Election Twitter hashtags:

Obama plugged in his TelePrompTer in 2003 causing the Northeast blackout of 2003. #KatrinaPiersonHistory — itsrobert (@itsrobert) August 3, 2016

Or a way for FEMA to guilt Tweet you into having a disaster plan:

#TBTPrep 2003 NE blackout: 21 power plants shut down & 50 mil affected. Prepare & stay safe! https://t.co/K4UXx5xAXj pic.twitter.com/FwiVbUU0vy — FEMA Region 3 (@FEMAregion3) August 11, 2016



Times Square on August 14, 2003 (Getty Images)

You can read a timeline of the events from The Plain Dealer, which describes the events thus: "A circuit breaker severs the last link between Ohio and Pennsylvania. Seeking the path of least resistance, power surges east through Pennsylvania and New York, across Niagara Falls and into Ontario, trying to reach Detroit." And on April 5, 2004, "the investigation cited a software glitch, inadequate operator training and trees too close to power lines."



Piled into a bus on August 14, 2003 (Getty Images)

And did you know that during the 2003 blackout, 30 million gallons of sewage went into our waterways because the backup power wasn't working at some wastewater treatment plants?