Explore every episode of the podcast NO EASY EXIT: CITY BLACKOUT

At 11:52 p.m. the elevator stops between floors 20 and 21. Then the lights go out, and not just yours: freezing rain has taken down the power across the whole city. You’re stuck in the dark with an old man in a wool coat whose name you’ve never asked.

By morning the building’s only staff member has gone home to his sick daughter, and the key to every door in a 400-person tower is on your lanyard. One elevator still runs, an 81-year-old on the 38th floor needs power to breathe, and the fuel log says the generator has 24 hours. You decide to check the tank yourself.

Along the way: why you never climb out of a stalled elevator · why the taps go dry above the fourth floor the moment the power dies · what a backup generator actually runs, and what it doesn’t · how a home oxygen machine works, and what the tank beside it is for · why a fuel log and a fuel gauge can disagree.