NEW YORK — The Long Island Rail Road has resumed service to Grand Central Madison following an electrical fire that injured four people — three of them firefighters — and shut down operations into the station for almost seven hours.
The MTA said in a press release that service resumed at 2:41 p.m. ET following a fire in a traction power substation that required power to be shut off. One LIRR power department employee suffered a minor injury, the agency said; the Fire Department of New York said none of the injures were life-threatening. The cause is under investigation by the LIRR fire marshal.
Service was rerouted to Penn Station or halted at Jamaica station in Queens during the incident.
The news site Gothamist reports that more than 100 firefighters were needed to control the two-alarm blaze that began about 8 a.m, with Fire Department of New York Commissioner Robert Tucker saying that the fire created “zero visibility” in the lower reaches of the station deep beneath Grand Central Terminal. Firefighters cut through a roll-down gate to reach the source of the fire, located in a basement beneath the 300-level tracks, NY1.com reports. Tucker said it took a “significant water to bring the fire under control;” control was achieved about 11:45 a.m
The MTA website shows most LIRR operations are on or near schedule as of 7 p.m. ET. Metro-North operations at Grand Central Terminal were not affected.
