Advertisement

Super storm Sandy takes out several major websites; flooding cited

Share

Electrons work for free, except, of course in major storms -- as several prominent websites discovered.

When the former Hurricane Sandy -- now technically a cyclone -- hit the New York area, it cut power to hundreds of thousands of people, including some major Internet providers. Many seeking news, gossip and other information found themselves temporarily bereft and relying on other technologies such as television and radio and newspaper websites.

Lost sites beginning Wednesday night included the Huffington Post, Gawker and the blog Mediaite. Huffington Post was back by Tuesday morning, but the site was a bit skimpier.

Advertisement

According to a statement posted on a website of the more traditional kind, CBS News, the problem seemed to be flooding.

Popular viral content website Buzzfeed issued a statement explaining that “Datagram, the ISP whose Manhattan servers host BuzzFeed, Huffington Post, Gawker, and other sites, has lost power,” CBS reported.

“Datagram’s website also appears to be offline, and online address listings for Datagram place the company in Manhattan’s financial district, which was heavily affected by flooding,” CBS reported.

The downed websites were coming back slowly.

Advertisement