Torrential Rains Hit Jersey Again

How’s the ark coming along?  Well, you might want to get back to work on it.  For the fifth time this week, and the 13th time this month, we had measurable rainfall here in South Plainfield, New Jersey.  Humid conditions throughout the day set the stage for another round of heavy rain starting around 6:45 PM this evening.

Things began to get interesting in the mid-afternoon as thunderstorms began to develop in Northeastern Pennsylvania.  These storms gradually moved southeastward into Sussex, Warren, and Morris counties setting off warnings there late Friday afternoon.  The weather began to change in Northwestern Middlesex County between 4:00 and 5:00 PM as towering cumulus clouds began to develop.

The severe weather in Northwestern Jersey produced damaging hail, 60 mile per hour winds, and dangerous cloud to ground lightning.  Here in South Plainfield, there were 299 lightning strikes between 6:05 PM and 6:30 PM on Friday.  Of those nearly three hundred strikes, 166 of them were from 6 to 12 miles away, 50 were from 24 to 40 miles away, 42 were from 0 to 6 miles away, and 41 were 12 to 24 miles away.

Around 6:45 PM, the rain began in earnest here in South Plainfield after skies had grown quite dark and threatening.  For the next half hour, approximately 1.55 inches of rain fell.  Through 8:10 PM EDT, approximately 1.65 inches of rain has fallen.  With Friday’s rain, there has been 9.32 inches of rain during the month of August in Northwestern Middlesex County with 7.02 inches falling in just the past six days.  Since mid-June, there has been 14.48 inches of rainfall.

For the year, there has been 28.55 inches of rain.  Elsewhere around the Garden State, Newark Airport was hit hard by the storm with sustained winds of 43 miles per hour with gusts up to 52 miles per hour.  Around the region, heavy rains from the line of storms that would eventually make its way through Jersey, produced landslides near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania that left three people dead.

Prior to the arrival of the storms on Friday evening, the temperature climbed up to 85.6 degrees for a high in South Plainfield with a dew point of 73.2 degrees and a heat index of 90.3 degrees, the highest in a week.  Maximum wind gusts on Friday reached eight miles per hour while the 10 minute average was two miles per hour.