The Statue of Liberty Experienced an Oddly-Timed Power Outage
The Statue of Liberty went dark on Tuesday night causing mass confusion on social media.
Only Lady Liberty’s torch and crown were visible in the night sky as the statue stood in darkness in New York Harbor for a few hours.
Several on Twitter suggested the power outage was in solidarity with A Day Without A Woman, the women’s strike planned for Wednesday across the United States.
Statue of Liberty is dark. No one's quite sure why yet pic.twitter.com/HyIMGzTKGh
— Brendan McHugh (@McHugh) March 8, 2017
Thank you Lady Liberty for standing with the resistance and going dark for #DayWithoutAWoman
: @randybals#StatueOfLibertypic.twitter.com/D0JG9MmSRj
— Women's March (@womensmarch) March 8, 2017
Statue of Liberty's lights are off tonight in honor of tomorrow's A DAY WITHOUT A WOMAN. @womensmarch pic.twitter.com/TnibSndEsq
— shannonwoodward (@shannonwoodward) March 8, 2017
I'm with her.
Statue of Liberty.— L.Wall (@realLWall) March 8, 2017
Today is a day without a woman and the Statue of Liberty is dark … pic.twitter.com/e3rX7JMvXD
— Tori (@_vrae) March 8, 2017
But alas, that was not the case. A statement by the National Park Service obtained by Fusion said the problem was a “temporary, unplanned outage” that was “likely due to work related to an ongoing project to activate a new emergency backup generator that is part of our last remaining Hurricane Sandy recovery projects.”
#BREAKING—The Statue of Liberty "experienced a temporary, unplanned outage" Tuesday night, National Park Service officer tells us over email pic.twitter.com/4vUnQmYNnv
— Fusion (@Fusion) March 8, 2017
Watch: The Statue of Liberty's lights go back on after more than an hour of darkness. https://t.co/5CE1psDMjjpic.twitter.com/qKGgG4IrLf
— AP Eastern U.S. (@APEastRegion) March 8, 2017
The NPS said it would be able to confirm the exact cause of for the outage on Wednesday morning.
The lights were soon back on for Lady Liberty, just a few hours after the lights went out, according to WABC, a local news station.