After Brief Respite During Much Of Weekend, Another Coastal Storm Set To Bring More Rain And Wind

After gloomy conditions dominated the weather over the Central Jersey region on Thursday and Friday, the sun returned for a brief appearance starting on Saturday morning, and continuing into midday on Sunday. The somewhat pleasant conditions were attributed to a weak area of high pressure that moved in after the coastal storm that hit late in the week last week. Following two days of rain that produced a total of 1.23 inches in Northwestern Middlesex County according to the data compiled by the GWC WX station. So far this month, there has been a total of 1.32 inches of rainfall with 93 percent coming on Thursday and Friday. The total rainfall for the month has all fallen in just four of the first eleven days of May.

However, the inclement weather is about to return as another coastal storm is winding up the Eastern Seaboard, and bringing some severe weather, if not drenching rains, to the Mid-Atlantic. Tornadoes have touched down in North Carolina while the Washington, D.C. area has seen torrential rains. According to the latest Accu-Weather forecast courtesy of New York’s WABC 7, this latest storm system, which is currently moving slowly into the Philadelphia area, has had a history of producing three to four inches of rain. Clouds have already begun to move over the Central Jersey area. Darkening skies began to take shape in South Plainfield at about 3:00 PM on Sunday afternoon.

Looking at the forecast from the National Weather Service office in Mount Holly, New Jersey, there is a 90 percent chance of rain starting after 11:00 PM EDT on Sunday Night with rainfall estimates ranging between a half and three quarters of an inches while on Monday, there is a 100 percent chance of another half to three quarters of an inch of rain. Consequently, forecast storm totals range between an inch to an inch and a half of rainfall. On top of that, a Coastal Flood Warning is currently in effect for much of the southern half of the Garden State, starting at midnight on Sunday and continuing until 8:00 AM on Tuesday morning. Developing low pressure approaching from the south is responsible for this.

With the low intensifying as it approaches the New Jersey shoreline, it will cause gale force winds to increase from the east, and that will cause minor tidal flooding from Delaware to New Jersey’s coast starting this evening at high tide. Winds will start out between 16 and 23 miles per hour, and then pick up to range between 20 and 24 miles per hour on Monday. Conditions will begin to taper off on Monday night as the steady rain becomes more showery. Chance of precipitation is 60 percent. The strong low will then combine with approaching high pressure from the west on Tuesday to create a pressure gradient that will result in breezy conditions during the day along with an afternoon high in the mid to upper 60s. After seeing the mean temperature above 60 degrees for five straight days last week, there has been three straight days of mean temperatures below 57 degrees.

As a result, the overall mean temperature for the month of May has fallen to 57 degrees with the mean max dropping from 68 degrees to 67 degrees while the mean minimum fell to 47.5 producing a diurnal range of about 20 degrees. So far this year, there has been 13.78 inches of rainfall in South Plainfield with the highest one day rainfall total occurring on Friday. The previous high was back on April 28th (1.12 inches).