It's supposed to snow in NJ again this week. Will the Shore see any flakes?
A winter storm is headed for New Jersey Friday night, the National Weather Service says, bringing with it the potential for gusty wind, rain and minor to moderate coastal flooding.
"It's the same pattern over and over and over," David Robinson, the state climatologist at Rutgers University, said. "If we don't get statewide a couple inches (of snow) on average, it could be the least snowy year going back to 1895."
The storm, expected to begin Friday afternoon and last into Saturday morning, could leave 1- to 2-inches of snow in Northwest New Jersey, but 1- to 1-1/2 inches of rain in Monmouth and Ocean counties, where temperatures are forecast to be in the upper 30s and lower 40s, Amanda Lee, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service said.
In a winter that has produced a blizzard in normally sunny Southern California and more than 100 inches of snow in Buffalo, New York, the Jersey Shore remains on the outside of a snow globe looking in. Even Tuesday morning, as Northern New Jerseyans woke up to as much as 8 inches of snow, residents in Monmouth and Ocean counties were left with dreary rain.
More:Could this be the winter without snow for the Jersey Shore?
The unseasonably warm winter has thrown some businesses off kilter. Ken's Hardware in Toms River has 300 shovels left over from last year and more than 200 bags of salt that have largely sat untouched, taking up space, Frank Kenny, a partner with the business, said.
"It’s like a ying and a yang," Kenny said. During major snow storms, "all we sell is salt, shovels, gloves and that’s it. We don’t sell anything else. It helps us when there’s a storm; we sell storm supplies. But then we'd be closed for two days."
The forecast for later this week calls for a storm system originating out of the southern plains to move north and east toward the Great Lakes and spawning off a secondary system that is expected to bring widespread precipitation to the region, Lee, said.
The lack of snow at the Shore fits a season-long pattern in which the jet stream, the atmospheric winds that steer weather systems across the country, has kept cold air to the north and west, Robinson said.
Not that winter is over. The long-term outlook for March is for temperatures to be seasonable to a little colder than average, leaving the door open for snow, he said.
"Up to today we’re at a record-low pace" for snowfall, Robinson said Wednesday. "That could change in one day. It’s not going to be tomorrow or Friday. Or Saturday or Sunday, however."
Michael L. Diamond is a business reporter who has been writing about the New Jersey economy and health care industry for more than 20 years. He can be reached at mdiamond@gannettnj.com.
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: NJ Weather: Winter storm to bring snow, rain and coastal flooding
