Heavy Rains and Severe Weather Ushers in Nice Weather for Next Few Days

The spring and summer of 2013 in the Mid-Atlantic and the Northeast has brought with it plenty of rain, but a lack of severe weather in terms of lightning, hail, high winds, and tornadoes. However, the storm system that moved through on Tuesday morning brought both a good deal of rain, and some severe weather. More importantly though, it ushered in a nice weather pattern that should last into this coming weekend.

Here at Greg’s Weather Center, there was about 0.7 inches of rainfall from the ball of strong and severe thunderstorms that barreled across New Jersey from Pennsylvania during the day on Tuesday. It also brought some severe weather to South Jersey including an EF0 tornado that produced 85 mile per hour winds in the Manahawkin section of Stafford Township in Ocean County, not too far from Long Beach Island. The twister was about 500 yards wide, and traveled about two miles. Residents in the Southern Ocean County town described the storm as being worse than Superstorm Sandy was when it came ashore in late October last year.

Rainfall in parts of Middlesex County were similar to that at GWC including 0.76 inches of rain in Edison, and 0.66 inches of rain in Woodbridge. Just under an inch fell in North Brunswick while Cranbury in the extreme southern portion of the county emerged the winner of the Tuesday rainfall totals with just under an inch and a quarter of rain. South Brunswick also had a decent amount of rain with 0.85 inches while East Brunswick came in with just under a half an inch. New Brunswick tallied 0.63 inches of rain on Tuesday. Over the past 30 days, there has been 5.13 inches of rain at GWC with 3.21 of that coming since the beginning of the month.

The good news is that the storm system responsible for all the rain and severe weather also brought in a nice change in the weather for the Garden State. Prior to the stormy weather on Tuesday, temperatures and humidity had been on the increase a bit. Dew points were getting into the low 70s for highs over the course of the weekend and Monday. While temperatures were still comfortable and there was a bit of a breeze, you could feel the stickiness in the air outside. Now, with the cold front and storm system moving through. Temperatures topped out at only 73 degrees today while the dew point only peaked at 66 before dropping to 50 during the course of the day on Wednesday.

The fall preview is expected to last through the weekend with temperatures climbing to the upper 70s and low 80s during the period under clear skies, and with low humidities. Overnight lows are expected to be mid 50s over the next couple days in Northwestern Middlesex County while Northwestern New Jersey, the Poconos, and Hudson County are expected to go down into the 40s. As we get into next week, the temperatures and humidity levels will be on the rise again as a more summer like pattern is expected to return.