While tornadoes are regular hazards in other parts of the country, in New Jersey not so much. When tornadoes do hit the Garden State, they tend to be relatively weak and short-lived in contrast to the usually more deadly and destructive tornadoes that touch down in the southern and central states.  

The Office of the New Jersey State Climatologist has documented each tornado that has touched down here since 1950. The most intense twister recorded since then reached EF-3 on the Enhanced Fujita scale, which rates tornadoes based on wind speeds and related damage, from 0 to 5. The last EF-3 was in September 2021 in Gloucester County. 

This year so far, New Jersey has had 10 tornadoes: one EF-0 twister, five EF-1s and four that measured at EF-2. In comparison, there were two in 2022. The year with the most tornadoes on record since 1950 was 1989, with 18. The state averages two tornadoes a year.  

But here’s the tornadic equivalent of the if-a-tree-falls-in-a-forest conundrum: According to the state climatologist’s office, “there are more tornado reports along the populated Garden State Parkway corridor, while there are not many reported around the sparsely populated Pinelands. This connection suggests that there may have been tornadoes in unpopulated areas that were not accounted for because no one actually saw and reported the tornado. This may also apply to other sparsely populated parts of the state, such as Cumberland and Salem counties.”