NEW YORK (AP) - New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg says the death toll in the city from the huge storm is up to 10.

He also says it could be three days or more before power is restored to hundreds of thousands of people now in the dark. He is giving no estimate on when public transit would be running, though he expects some buses be running later Tuesday.

The megastorm Sandy caused 13-foot storm surges in Manhattan. Trees also fell throughout the area. New York City is starting to clean up after the storm hit late Monday into Tuesday causing flooding, high winds and major power outages.

Patients moved out of NYC hospital without power

More than 200 patients have been moved out of a New York City hospital that lost power to other medical facilities.

The evacuation of New York University Tisch Hospital began Monday night after a generator failure. It was completed Tuesday morning.

Ambulances came from around the city to help transport the sick. Patients were taken to other hospitals including Mount Sinai, the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer, Lenox and Bellevue.

Doctors and nurses first moved the sickest and youngest patients. Some were on respirators operating on battery power.

Phone companies start checking storm damage

Phone and cable companies are still assessing the damage in the storm-hit areas of the East Coast amid widespread reports of phone outages in flooded areas.

Cablevision, which serves parts of Long Island, New York City and New Jersey, says it's experiencing widespread outages due to the loss of power. Verizon Communications, the biggest phone company in the region, says some facilities in downtown Manhattan are flooded, shutting down phone and Internet service. The company doesn't yet know the extent of outages in New Jersey, which bore the brunt of the storm.

AT&T says there are "issues" in hard-hit areas, and it's in the early stages of checking for damage and restoring service.