Video captures hundreds of jet skis zipping down the river in New York City
The jet skis were part of the annual NYC Jetski Invasion that has been running since 2017. According to the event's website, the invasion brings in about 600 to 800 riders per year.
The video, taken by Jessica Smith in Brooklyn, shows hundreds of jet ski riders parading down the East River and under one of New York's many bridges.
"New York City has many historic Landmarks, Brooklyn Bridge, Statue of Liberty, World Trade Center, and The Intrepid Museum, just to name a few. So, what better way to enjoy the best city in the world than from your own personal watercraft!" the site said.
Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at fernando.cervantes@gannett.com and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.
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New York Post
9 hours ago
- New York Post
Wagner Park's disastrous eco-zealot makeover is an insult to downtown New York City
The 'new' Wagner Park in Battery Park City opened this week after a two-year closure and a nearly $300 million redesign. But New Yorkers should howl to the moon — and to the state legislature in Albany — over the desecration of a public jewel, done to suit the agenda of environmental zealots egged on by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo. It's the most rotten Lower Manhattan scam since hustlers sold 'tickets' to the free Staten Island Ferry — only the warped park's victims aren't tourists but Wagner Park's millions of annual users, most of them New Yorkers. The original Wagner Park, near Battery Park City's southern tip, opened in 1996 to universal acclaim. New York Times architectural critic Paul Goldberger called it 'one of the finest public spaces New York has seen in at least a generation.' Advertisement 7 Wagner Park's once-level, river-facing side swelled into a stepped cliff of wooden, bleacher-like seats in an effort to prevent flooding that some feel went too far. Tamara Beckwith Battery Park City residents as well as New Yorkers from every part of town and tourists agreed. They fell in love with the 3.5-acre oasis' peaceful, river-fronting lawns that were ideal for sunbathing and taking in views of the harbor and the Statue of Liberty. A popular Italian restaurant buzzed indoors and outdoors with happy sun-worshippers and sightseers. Now, they're all gone in the name of 'saving' the park from a mythical flood that exists only in its designers' imaginations. Advertisement The state-controlled Battery Park City Authority is, naturally, trying to cosmeticize the debacle with promises of future outdoor arts programs and hype over four planted 'ecological zones' that merely take space away from the original lawns. 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Mature London plane trees were uprooted. The park's central area was elevated 10 feet in order to conceal a buried flood wall. Much of the lawn was sliced and diced into a ziggurat of paver-surfaced ramps and stairs that have no clear entry points. Advertisement 7 Jon Pepper, a Battery Park City resident, said Wagner Park's new pavilion 'looks like bunkers on the Maginot Line,' a reference to France's WWII defense that failed to stop the Nazi advance. Tamara Beckwith The park's once-level, river-facing side swelled into a stepped cliff of wooden, bleacher-like seats where I saw precious few users on two sunny afternoons this week. The revamped lawn is, on paper, only slightly smaller than the original one. But it's effectively much smaller due to the way it's segmented into landscaped portions that aren't conducive to lazing and lolling. The modest concession building on the park's eastern side gave way to a lumbering red-brick structure that looms over the lawns' remnants like an intergalactic invader. 7 New Yorkers fell in love with the 3.5-acre former oasis' peaceful, river-fronting lawns that were ideal for sunbathing and taking in views of the harbor and the Statue of Liberty. Helayne Seidman 7 The park's old, expansive lawn spaces were conducive to lolling and lazing. Gabriella Bass The BPCA put out a 'request for proposals' to operate a two-level, 5,000-square-foot restaurant — one-third larger than previous license holder Gigino's. The greater number of seats, combined with the pavilion's 'community center' and rooftop viewing area, will shatter Wagner Park's low-key ambience that was at the heart of its charm. How did this all happen? Advertisement Besides enriching a legion of architects, engineers and landscape designers, the mutant 'park' is supposed to protect against a theoretical, worse-than-worst case, one-day-or-someday '100-year' flood caused by rising sea levels. In fact, no such catastrophe has ever occurred. The original park was so securely engineered that Wagner Park suffered no damage whatsoever when superstorm Sandy caused the city's highest sea level rise ever recorded. 7 Locals led a fight to save the old Wagner Park that ultimately failed. Gabriella Bass All of landfill-based Battery Park City was designed to withstand any conceivable high water. Which was why, as New York Magazine reported and illustrated, the entire three-mile long complex 'shone brightly' after Sandy while most of the rest of Manhattan was dark. Local residents fought fiercely against losing their beloved oasis, but in the end, the 'resiliency' lobby of climate-change alarmists carried the day. 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New York Post
12 hours ago
- New York Post
Selena Gomez is making New Yorkers stop and smell the … billboards
There's a strange scent in the air around the city — and it's not just the smell of garbage in August. Three scratch-and-sniff billboards for Selena Gomez's Rare Beauty have been installed in Manhattan. When passersby agitate specific areas on the advertisements, they get a whiff of the new Rare Eau de Parfum — the first fragrance from the phenomenally popular cosmetics brand. 'This makes me feel like I'm in elementary school,' said Melanie Peralta, a 34-year-old consultant who lives in Bushwick and smelled one of the billboards in Soho, on the corner of Grand and Lafayette, on Wednesday morning. 'It reminds me of those smelly markers growing up.' 4 Three scratch-and-sniff billboards for Selena Gomez's Rare Beauty have been installed in Manhattan, including this one at Grand and Lafayatte. Stephen Yang 4 Melanie Peralta enjoyed the ad's vanilla scent. Stephen Yang It took her five scratches to get a hit of the fragrance — she was scratching in the wrong spot at first — but she was satisfied in the end. 'It smells good, like light vanilla,' she said. 'I'm more intrigued to want to smell the actual perfume now.' To make the billboards — which are also located at Canal Street and Broadway, and the Highline and West 27th, and are as large as 25-by-7 feet — Rare Beauty first developed a scented ink. Then the ink was wrapped in microbubbles that were printed onto different parts of the billboard. When scratched, they release the fragrance. The billboards, which were installed in late July and are up through August 10, are refreshed regularly to keep the smell strong. 'The activation was inspired by something many of us remember from growing up, those iconic magazine perfume peel-offs,' Ashley Murphy, Rare Beauty's company's Vice President of Consumer Marketing, told The Post. 'We wanted to reimagine it in a way.' One woman fretted about looking odd smelling a wall. Fans of the scent, which will be released in stores on August 7, can scan a QR code on the billboard, which will link them to a Shopify app where they can order a free sample. While it's impossible to know how many people have sniffed the billboards, an announcement video about them got over six million views on Instagram, one of the company's top performing posts for the year. Some germ-weary New Yorkers refuse to participate. 'I don't want to touch something all these other people have touched,' said Simon Sakhai, a 37-year-old who runs a longevity startup and was passing by a billboard Wednesday morning. 'This is Manhattan! You don't touch things and then smell them. You never know what you're going to get.' 4 Simon Sakhai worried about the germs he'd encounter touching the ads. Stephen Yang But, he added, 'For $100, I'd do it.' A 38-year-old who works in a pottery studio around the corner from the Soho billboard, was also apprehensive. 'Since the Covid times I have tried not to touch public things,' she told The Post. But her curiosity — and her admiration for Selena Gomez, whose face is also on the billboard — persuaded her. 4 There are three of the large billboards in Manhattan. They're up through August 10. Stephen Yang 'Selena is perfect, she's just adorable. I love her,' said the woman, who declined to give her name. 'I decided I just wanted to try it.' Aside from the germs, she did worry about what others would think of her smelling the ads. She said, 'I don't want people to wonder what I am doing sniffing a wall.'
New York Post
14 hours ago
- New York Post
Hazardous bacterial bloom hitting US lakes is a danger to people and pets, officials warn
No need for vacationers to test the waters here, experts say. The summer vacation spoiler has been identified as a cyanobacterial bloom — and the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) says that the crummy blue-green conditions seem to be spreading, with a noticeable increase in scale since Aug. 2. Currently, the contamination stretches approximately 160 miles and impacts coastal communities, ranging from Monroe, Michigan, to Port Clinton, Ohio. The Buckeye State's beloved Sandusky Bay is an especially adversely affected area and has comparatively strong concentrations of cyanobacteria — and cyanotoxins, a byproduct of the microorganisms — in the lake water. The Ohio Department of Health has advised residents and visitors along the western shore of Lake Erie to keep out of the water due to 'unsafe levels' of bacterial contamination. In concentrated amounts, cyanotoxins can result in mild conditions ranging from diarrhea, headaches and skin irritation to more serious, life-threatening states depending on prior conditions, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Lake Erie is a popular weekend getaway destination for Midwesterners and New Yorkers alike looking to beat the heat for a few days. Jacek Chabraszewski – 'If you see scum, keep your pets and yourself out of the water,' urged the NCCOS in a statement. The organization also said that the bloom can be particularly intense during certain weather conditions. During calm, low wind periods, it gathers on the surface as 'scum,' rather than being broken up by the Great Lake's raucous waves. The NCCOS maintains that over the past decade or so, concentrated cyanobacteria sightings in Lake Erie have become more common, especially from June to October. The EPA explained that the microorganisms are 'very important to aquatic ecosystems' because they are photosynthetic — which is why conditions are worse in summertime — and support marine food webs; however, excessive growth can lead to concerns for aquatic and human health alike. Bearing that in mind, those looking to watch where they wade this summer can take a peek at a consistently updated map of Lake Erie by NCCOS that specifically monitors algal blooms. Lake Erie is also commonly recognized as the most polluted of the Great Lakes, per research by the University of Michigan. SVDPhoto – While the recent blooms don't impact lakegoers in New York, The Empire State has been exposed to its own fair share of aquatic advisories this summer — even trendy Hamptons beaches have been affected. Windmill Beach in Sag Harbor was rated the 7th worst bacteria-rated beach in the U.S. this year, per a report from Surfrider Foundation — and just two years back, the EPA reported that over half of New York beaches are contaminated by sewage and feces.
