Jersey has had its share of devastating storms over the last few centuries; this page will collect articles, photos, stories, etc. about them in one place. If you have a story, photo, etc. about any of the hurricanes, blizzards, etc. that have swept through the Garden State, please send them to us at [email protected]

HURRICANE 1818
from the New Jersey Mirror 9 Dec 1818
A violent gale from the southwest commenced about 10 o'clock last Saturday evening (December 5, 1818) and continued with little intermission until Sunday morning at sunrise. The damage to the port of Philadelphia was extensive. Nothing this severe has been experienced for twenty years.

HURRICANE- AUG 1881
from the New Jersey Mirror 17 Aug 1881:
A HEAVY SHOWER of wind and rain visited this vicinity shortly after five o'clock on Saturday afternoon. The day had been extremely hot, said to have been the hottest of the season, the mercury rising to 100 in the shade. The storm came up suddenly, the wind blowing a young hurricane, trimming dead limbs and some live ones from the trees and strewing the streets with them. The rain followed as suddenly and for some time the rain-fall was heavy, the lightning sharp and the thunder startling, indicating that the lightning had struck something near by. The shower was over in less than a half hour. Soon after the storm it was learned that the lightning had done fatal work on the road between Mount Holly and Lumberton.
It appears that just as the shower was approaching, Isaac Fenimore, living near Lumberton, drove to the Mount Holly depot for Mrs. Blanche Short, engaged as a domestic in the family, who was waiting to be conveyed to his residence. Mr. F. remarked that he thought they could get home before the shower, and they started. When within about a hundred yards of D. B. Coles' house, Mr. Fenimore noticed that the storm was gaining on him, and remarked, "We will have to turn into Coles' for shelter." The next that he remembers was recovering from what seemed like a deep sleep, and seeing his two horses lyin in the road. It seemed very strange that the animals should fall on a level piece of ground, but tossing the lines to the young woman, he alighted and proceeded to the relief of the horses, only to find them dead. The truth then began to dawn on his mind, and looking into the wagon, he saw that the woman had fallen to one side, the little girl, who had been thrown to the bottom of the carriage, clamboring to her mother's lap and crying bitterly. He at once seized the child in his arms and started to Coles' for help, falling twice before reaching the house, and again falling when he reached the house, and again falling when he reached the kitchen door. Unfortunately there were no men about the house. The little girl was left with some women, while Mr. Fenimore returned to the scene of the accident, not yet being willing to believe the worst. He found no signs of life in either woman or horses; and he then started for Lumberton, where he procured assistance.
An examination of the scene indicated that the lightning first struck a fence, the pickets of which were torn and cut, passing thence to the wagon, breaking a post and cutting a hole in the curtain, striking the woman and passing to the horses. Mrs. Short's face and neck bore traces of the lightning, while Mr. Fenimore's left shoe was cut open and his foot and leg were burned. The escape of the gentleman from death seems miraculous, but that the little girl, seated between him and the mother, should escape without a scratch, seems stranger still. Mrs. Short, the deceased, was a widow, about 25 years of age, with the one child, aged about 3 years. They had lived with Mr. Fenimore seven weeks, and at the time of the sad occurrence were just returning from a visit to some relatives in Baltimore. Coroner Carr viewed the body, but deemed an inquest unnecessary and handed the body to Undertaker Keeler. Mr. Fenimore was in Mount Holly on Monday, and with the exception of a stiffness in the left leg, feels no bad results of the lightning. The little girl also complains of slight soreness, but otherwise is all right. The lightning visited other localities during the storm. On the farm occupied by Thomas Toy, on Wood Lane, two cows and a bull were killed; 20 sheep were killed near Vincentown; a large pine tree was split on B. F. Deacon's farm near Lumberton; and an untenanted house near Eayrestown, was completely shattered. The shops at Smithville were struck but no damage was done. The wind blew a chimney from a house at Smithville and one from a house at Jobstown. At Ellisburg three cattle belonging to J. Peters were struck and killed. The storm visited Philadelphia before venting its fury in this vicinity, where considerable damage was done in unroofing houses, breaking trees, &c. Later Long Branch came in for a blast, hundreds of peope being caught on the beach and getting soaked before the could reach shelter.

THUNDERSTORM- JUL 1922
from the New Jersey Mirror Jul 19, 1922:
The record rain and electrical storm on Thursday caused much damage around Mount Holly. It was a veritable cloud burst and some of the principal streets of the town were inundated to the depth of a foot or more and resembled raging torrents. Much soil was washed down off the Mount and from nearby building operations on High street and was carried down the new road-way, leaving that thoroughfare in a very untidy condition after the water receded--a condition that the county road authorities and the township committee have failed to remedy thus far.

The volume of water was so great that the storm sewer which is supposed to carry the water from High down Water street, was inadequate and the miniature flood ppoured over the hump at the intersection of High, Water, and Garden streets and continued its passage to the creek by way of Main street. Pavements were overflowed and water ran into some stores and basements as thought that were the natural thing to do. An automobile, left standing along the curb, started off by the force of the water which poured around it, and was swept down the street until stopped by Dr. Longsdorf's car which was standing in front of the Mirror building. The creek and Buttonwood run rose rapidly and approached the flood stage as the result of the heavy rain fall but no serious damage was done, beyond the drowning of a number of chickens whose owners did not come to their rescue in time. Myrtle Stewart, 14-year-old daughter of Charles Stewart, a farmer, who occupies the Dennis farm along the railroad between Smithville and Mount Holly, was instantly killed by a bolt of lightning that cut a two-inch hole in the side of the house. The girl had gone upstairs to lower the windows and the bolt hit her while standing at a window. Her parents ran upstairs when they heard the crash and found the child dead. Her hair and clothing were burned by the deadly fluid and she was otherwise marked. Coroner Glover viewed the body and issued a burial permit. Another daughter, who was about the same age, was killed by a train near the Stewart farm about three years ago.
The family of William Kelly had a narrow escape during the same storm when lightning struck the tenant house in which they lived on the Asher B. Parker farm, near Pointville. The building and its contents, valued at $3,000 were destroyed. Another bolt struck a big barn, which burned with a loss of $10,000.
Camp Dix firemen saved other buildings on the same place. Another $10,000 loss occurred on the Richard Rahilly farm near Wrightstown, when the barns, outbuildings and contents were destroyed.
At the farm of John NAsh, a grain-filled barn valued at $5,000 was lost in a fire caused by lightning. A bolt that struck the home of Rev. B. E. Eldridge, of the Florence Baptist Church, darted around the kitchen until it found the refrigerator which it entered and apparently exploded in a cake of ice. Food was scattered around the room. Members of the pastor's family suffered only from a bad fright and the loss of provender. Lightning struck a weather vane which adorned the top of a barn on the Ivins Wright farm opposite the Fair Grounds during the electrical display which accompanied the sever storm. Some shingles were knocked off the roof but the grain-filled building was not set on fire. A large evergreen tree was struck in the Mount Holly cemetery and a tree at Edward Hack's boat landing was also hit by lightning.

BLIZZARD OF '78
Washington Post Jan 21 1978:
Six-foot drifts driven by 50-mile winds piled up in Manhattan today and the worst snow-storm to hit the Northeast in nine years virtually closed down Boston and played havoc along the entire Eastern Seaboard.
The storm's icy tentacles reached as far west as Kentucky and Ohio, blanketing Cincinnati under a record 16 inches of snow within 24 hours. It was the East's third snowstorm in eight days. New York Mayor Edward Koch declared his first snow emergency. The city's airports were closed as crews labored to clear the runways of dangerous drifts.
Amtrak's Metroliner service had to be shut down lest the air intakes on the fast trains' undercarriages become clogged with snow.
Thanks to 225 plows, the New Jersey Turnpike was open - under a 35 mph speed limit - for anyone, as a turnpike official put it, "stupid enough to drive."
Unlike the storm of 1969, this one did not catch large numbers of people on the roads or at the airports.
If this city was coping reasonably well with 2,500 workers and 1,100 vehicles on storm duty, up north in Buffalo a note of amusement was heard.
The city that became synonymous with snowdrifts and subzero weather last winter, when it was under a seemingly perpetual blizzard , has been having a mild winter.
"We are sypmathetic with the rest of the nation, but it's nice to have company. We're glad we're no longer the only place people turn to for reports of bad weather," said Charles Poth, assistant to Buffalo's mayor.
On the other hand, in Oswego, N.Y., on Lake Ontario, Mayor John Fitzgibbons said 22 inches of snow was expected today and tonight on top of the 52 inches that have fallen since Saturday.