We're only a week into March, and some New Jersey towns and cities have already been soaked with an entire month's worth of rain, according to data tracking the latest in a string of storms to hit our region.
With another storm targeting the Garden State area this weekend, many other places could reach their normal monthly rainfall totals by Sunday morning.
As of Thursday morning, these 15 towns and cities had already been drenched in rain for an entire month, according to data from the Rutgers New Jersey Weather Network and the Cooperative Rain, Hail, and Snow Network, a group of trained weather observers known as cocorahs:
- City of waves (Ocean County): 5.00 inch
- Eatontown (Monmouth County): 4.89 inch
- Point Pleasant Beach (Ocean County): 4.83 inch
- Bradley Beach (Monmouth County): 4.79 inch
- I changed the sea (Monmouth County): 4.76 inch
- Manasquan (Monmouth County): 4.75 inch
- Wildwood Crest (Cape May County): 4.73 inch
- Neptune Twp. (Monmouth County): 4.73 inch
- Oceanport (Monmouth County): 4.70 inch
- Ocean Twp. (Monmouth County): 4.68 inch
- Neptune City (Monmouth County): 4.61 inch
- Long branch (Monmouth County): 4.56 inch
- Middle Twp. (Cape May County): 4.56 inch
- Estelle Manor (Atlantic County): 4.54 inch
- Berkeley Twp. (Ocean County): 4.52 inch
Based on historical averages, most areas of New Jersey typically get between 4 and 4.5 inches of rain during the entire month of March.
At the National Weather Service's three main weather reporting stations in New Jersey, one of them — Atlantic City International Airport in Pomona — came close to reaching its normal monthly precipitation total, according to agency data.
Atlantic City measured 4.07 inches of rain during the first six days of March, and its normal monthly total is 4.52 inches.
Weather service data shows Newark Liberty International Airport has already received 2.88 inches of rain this month, which is 1 and a quarter inches away from its normal March total of 4.13 inches, while Trenton-Mercer Airport in Ewing has collected 2.95 inches of rain this month and needs only to just over an inch to reach the normal March total of 4 inches.
A new storm is on the way
A new storm system drifting through New Jersey on Saturday is expected to drop between a half inch and 1.5 inches of rain across the state from Saturday afternoon through Sunday morning, forecasters say. Although major flooding is not expected, strong winds are likely to blow on Sunday and Monday, after the storm moves away from our area.
“There is a 30-50% chance that wind speeds will exceed 45 mph, which could result in sporadic tree damage,” the Mount Holly Weather Office said Thursday afternoon. “Due to the already saturated ground, tree damage may be greater than usual at these speeds.”
Current weather radar
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Lynn Melisurgo It can be reached at LMelisurgo@njadvancemedia.com Or on X in @LensReality.