WE didn’t think it would happen, but Hurricane Sandy – at 800 miles in diameter, the largest storm in recorded history to hit the Eastern Seaboard of the US – has managed to bring New York City to its knees.

Across the US, more than 6.5 million people have lost power, the New York subway system has been flooded and closed, several hospitals have been evacuated, and one of the world’s most powerful financial institutions, the New York Stock Exchange, is surrounded by sandbags after closing for the longest period of time due to a natural disaster since 1888.

New Yorkers are used to storm warnings – we get several every year. Usually, the damage is restricted to a few trees, but this storm was different.

On Saturday, only four days before the city’s Halloween Day parade, my wife returned home from Washington to news that the city was facing a “Frankenstorm”. Hurricane Sandy would merge with two other weather systems and drive into New York with devastating force.

We’d heard it all before, of course, but this time the weather experts seemed certain.

As the hurricane was set to land at about 6pm on Monday, we had two days to prepare.

Strangely, there was still a good deal of scepticism.

We joked about what sort of bathing suit to buy so we could swim to the local shops to buy whatever might be needed the day after.

Nevertheless, on Sunday evening we paid a visit to our local food store to buy supplies.

Bottled water? Check. Non-perishable food?

Check. Flashlight and batteries? Check. Tape to prevent our windows from shattering into a thousand sharp edges? Check.

Like us, many residents refused to leave their homes, certain that Sandy would peter out unceremoniously before doing much damage, as so many other storms have done before.

Charles Carr, a student who lives in Brighton Beach, on Coney Island, summed it up: “I’m not going to spend an extra $400 a night on a hotel room to escape what is likely to be much ado about nothing.”

CONEY Island, on the Atlantic coast, was in a US government-mandated evacuation area.

Transport across the five boroughs has been closed, which means a day or two off work for most people who ply their trade in Manhattan.

Six of the subway tunnels closest to Wall Street and the downtown financial centre have been flooded and experts are unsure how long it will take to have the system fully up and running again.

The local government listed a mandatory evacuation notice for low-lying areas of New York on Sunday evening, which has affected people in the hundreds of thousands.

By 6pm on Monday, much of lower Manhattan was already under water.

Down State Medical Center, Bellevue Hospital and NYU Medical Center had all shuttered their doors, with Bellevue having a particularly difficult time after its basement, which houses its power facilities, was swamped with seawater. Patients have been evacuated to hospitals outside the Manhattan area, or to the northern portion of the island, which is at a substantially higher elevation.

With public transportation out of commission, an army of ambulances had to make the trip, each carrying one or two patients to safer destinations.

One of the most dramatic moments came when a building front collapsed. The gaping hole on 15th Street and 8th Avenue is open to the public. Thankfully, no injuries were reported.

Michelle Fix, who lives 200ft away, said: “I was in my flat and it was hard to hear anything for the howling of the wind. Then suddenly all was quiet.

A friend of mine called my mobile to tell me a building had come crashing down just outside my own building, so I went outside to check it out.

“You could see right inside the building’s apartments because the whole front wall of the top two floors was torn off. It was totally surreal.

“It was difficult to even stand outside without being blown over for the fierceness of the wind. I had to grab on to the nearest light pole at one point to avoid being carried away.”

We hunkered in front of the telly, sure that within several hours we would know if our preparations were sufficient.

As it happened, for us living on some of the highest ground the borough of Brooklyn has to offer, it was a non-event.

A little rain, a little wind and a bottle of wine later and it was all over. But now the clean-up begins.

The South Street Seaport, one of New York’s popular tourist destinations, is under water, its fate shared by the looping highway that circles Manhattan Island, but which now more accurately resembles a rushing river.