

He wants to know how quickly electricity moves through wires and how transformers step down 138,000 volts of electricity to the 120 volts that power a clock radio. ''Meaning customers didn't notice?''įor the next hour, Miller repeatedly interrupts Rana's carefully taught Power Grid 101 seminar, peppering him with questions. ''They lost power for a second,'' Rana says. Rana studies the map, then turns back to Miller. There's a sudden edge in his voice, an authority that erases all trace of the kid in him. ''Something just happened on Roosevelt Island.'' ''That's my district,'' Miller says, gesturing toward a map of the Upper East Side. Technicians tap at keyboards beneath large blinking maps and computer screens.Īs he is shaking hands with Lou Rana, vice president of Manhattan Electric Operations, the Con Ed department that oversees electricity distribution to the borough, something catches his attention in the War Room. 11, when it became the focus of efforts to restore power to Lower Manhattan, as the War Room.
QUINN AND ROSE WARROOM WINDOWS
The elevator doors open, and Miller is led to a boardroom with windows looking onto a large chamber known, since Sept.

''It was some of the original supporting band members and then, like, look-alikes - which was better actually.'' ''It was, like, not really Abba,'' he says.

On the short side, with a baby face framed by jug ears, he looks like a boy on a school field trip - an impression hardly softened by his account of an Abba concert he attended the night before on Coney Island. Riding the elevator on a visit to Con Ed headquarters on Irving Place, Miller stands dwarfed between the two security agents who escort him everywhere. It's easy to underestimate Gifford Miller, the 32-year-old speaker of the New York City Council.
