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NEW YORK, NY August 04, 2006 —Con Ed took the heat again yesterday, as state assembly members grilled the company's chief executive about the response to last month's blackout in Queens. WNYC's Beth Fertig has more.

All along, Con Ed has insisted it didn't know that about 25,000 customers, totaling 100,000 people, were affected during the blackout until a door to door survey was conducted.

But Queens Assemblyman Michael Gianaris said officials should have known because peak consumption fell dramatically in the first 2 days.

GIANARIS: The amount of megawatts that were being distributed to the Long Island City Network dropped to such a degree that they could not explain it by conservation alone.

Con Ed CEO Kevin Burke said some of the dropoff was attributed to conservation efforts by LaGuardia airport and other large customers with their own generators. But he promised a more thorough investigation on the causes of the blackout and the company's response. For WNYC I'm Beth Fertig.