Severe thunderstorms leave thousands in NJ without power

🌧️Strong thunderstorms moved across New Jersey late Thursday afternoon

🌧️Hundreds of branches and trees fell because of gusty winds

🌧️Heavy tree damage and power outages forced the closure of Marlboro High School

New Jersey is feeling the impact of Thursday's thunderstorms with power outages and the closure of a NJ Transit line on Friday morning.

Over 23,000 JCP&L, PSE&G and Atlantic City Electric customers are still without power as of 11:15 a.m. following the strong line of thunderstorms that rolled across New Jersey late Thursday afternoon, bringing down hunrdeds of trees and branches.

As of 11:15 a.m. Friday, the reported outages were:

• JCP&L: 22,024 customers without power, mostly in Monmouth (Freehold Township, Hazlet, Manalapan, Marlboro, Middletown and Matawan) and Middlesex counties (East Brunswick, Old Bridge and Spotswood)
• PSE&G: 1,385 customers without power mostly in Mercer County (Ewing, Hopewell)
• Atlantic City Electric and Orange & Rockland Electric reported scattered outages in their respective service areas

ALSO READ: Chief Meteorologist Dan Zarrrow's forecast

"Bow echo" brought gusty winds

Last night's storms caused dozens of reports of downed trees and wind damage. The National Weather Service received reports of trees falling onto houses in Colts Neck, Cranford, Keansburg, Middletown and Red Bank, along with a tree on top of a vehicle in Harding. A tree crushed a bus shelter on Route 206 in front of Rider University in Lawrence.

Trees also fell onto many local roads, including Route 29 in Lambertville and Hopewell, Route 34 in Matawan and Route 206 in Princeton.

The Marlboro-Matawan-Old Bridge area of Monmouth County was especially hard hit by the storms, according to Chief Meteorologist Dan Zarrow. Gusty winds in Marlboro-Matawan-Old Bridge were the result of a bow echo that moved through the area. It's a type of image that appears on radar as a curved or bow line

"They were right at the peak of the bow echo that rolled through there. It looks like the worst wind happened just before the rain started to fall, catching people off-guard," Zarrow said.

Damage cancels last day of school

Marlboro Township said its outages were caused by a transmission trip that took out one of the breakers out of the substation and a pole fire on a high-tension transmission line coming in from Old Bridge.

Marlboro Mayor Jonathan L. Hornik told New Jersey 101.5 that heavy tree damage and a continuing power outage have forced the cancellation of classes on the last day of the school year at Marlboro High School.

JCP&L crews started working on restoration Thursday night and brought the number of outages from a high of approximately 100,000 customers to about 27,000 by Friday morning, according to spokesman Chris Hoenig.

"We are going to bring some resources down from northern New Jersey as well to help out in central," Hoenig told New Jersey 101.5. "Many of them are already on site and working. We expect that full number to be on site by sometime this afternoon, so it'll be about 220." Hoenig said.

Hoenig said a general restoration time will be issued but expects most service to be back before that time.

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Trains and concerts impacted

NJ Transit says its North Jersey Coast Line will remain suspended Friday morning due to downed trees near Middletown. Cross-honoring is in effect with NJ Transit and private bus carriers.

There were 61 departures canceled from Newark on Thursday and another seven so far on Friday, according to flightaware.com.

The Barefoot Country Music Festival on the beach in Wildwood was shut down early Thursday evening due to the lightning strikes near the beach but was reopened at 9 p.m. with performances by Rascal Flatts and Megan Maroney.

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