What to Know
- A second round of heavy rain and thunderstorms punished the tri-state area early Tuesday, on the heels of a first round Monday evening
- Most of the lingering rain from this blast should move out by midday, with scattered showers possible in the afternoon and evening
- The weather improves later in the week, with Storm Team 4 expecting Thursday to kick off a stretch of beautiful summer days
Wild weather tore through the tri-state, throttling the region for more than 12 hours as hundreds of thousands of people grappled with flooding conditions, nightmare commutes and lack of electricity -- a ferocious end to the heat wave.
The storms have also been blamed for at least one death -- a 17-year-old Neptune, New Jersey, boy who lost his life in a house fire. The power had been out at the home at the time, authorities said; a cause is under investigation.
Lightning lit up the night sky for hours Monday night -- and much of the tri-state saw 2.5 to 3 inches -- or more -- of water fall between Monday afternoon and Tuesday mid-morning. Parts of Nassau County topped the charts near 4 inches of rain while JFK was swamped under 3.52 inches.
Huge hailstones fell, trees came down and there appeared to be no relief with several punishing rounds of rain and storms refusing to loosen their grip on a large swath of the tri-state from about 4 p.m. Monday through 10 a.m. Tuesday.
The number of potential injuries in the series of storms, which tumbled into the region Monday afternoon, briefly paused just before midnight and returned with a vengeance ahead of the peak Tuesday morning rush, wasn't immediately clear. Get real-time transit alerts here and check the latest severe weather alerts for your neighborhood here.
Most of the lingering rain from that blast moved out by midday, though scattered showers are possible in the afternoon and evening. The good news: It'll feel much cooler with highs only creeping back into the mid-to-upper 70s. High pressure building back into the region will bring back bright and beautiful weather by the middle of the week, with more comfortable temps in the 80s.
Wednesday could still start out a bit damp -- with a high of 82 expected for the day -- but Storm Team 4 says once we hit Thursday we're in line for a series of gorgeous summer days that should stick around through early next week.
Track the weather with our interactive radar below.
Monday night's storms brought damaging winds, hail and torrential rain to all parts of the tri-state. There were a slew of power outages and road closures amid reports of trees coming down onto wires and streets the area.
"I was scared because I was in sandals. Water almost to my waist," said Amanda Denesha, who was in Gowanus when a flash flood turned roads into rivers.
Uber Driver Walid Shaawon said the water came up close to his car's window in just seconds. He was stranded on Carroll Street hours after he and his passenger escaped the rising water by crawling out the windows.
About 388,000 customers in Monmouth County lost power due to the storms, with more outages reported in Connecticut's Fairfield County and Con Ed still battling to get some back on line in the city — meaning there could have been as many as one million people throughout the tri-state in the dark at one point.
