A transformer fire cut power to tens of thousands of properties in Manhattan for most of Saturday night.

Many of the towering electronic screens of New York's famous Times Square went dark, businesses were forced to close and some resorted to using torches or their mobile phones to see in the subways.

Broadway went dark along with much of Midtown and the Upper West Side on Saturday night when a Con Ed equipment failure cut power to hundreds of thousands of people in Manhattan.

Straphangers were led out of subway tunnels, firefighters responded to numerous reports of people trapped in elevators, and nearly a dozen Broadway shows shut down for the night after the outage hit at around 6:55 p.m.

Electricity started to come back at around 10 p.m.. Con Edison said all power was back on at around 11:40 p.m.