Flood Watch in Effect for Scotch Plains-Fanwood as Storm's Intensity Wanes

A flood watch is in effect for Union County through this evening as the rain storm that brought flooding and damage to our area all night starts to leave the area.

NJ DOT is reporting Sunday morning that the Route 22 W ramp from Bonnie Burn Road/Park Avenue in Scotch Plains remains closed due to flooding. Portions of Route 22 between Rock and West End avenues in North Plainfield are also closed.

PSE&G continues to deal with power outages throughout North Jersey. According to its Web site Sunday morning between 2,001 and 5,000 people were still without power in Union County. Outages are scattered throughout our area, but the hardest hit was Rahway, which accounted for many of those outages. As of Sunday afternoon, about half of those outages were apparently taken care of.

NJ Transit reports that the Raritan Valley line is running again. The transit company had shut it down, along with several other lines, Saturday due to weather-related conditions.

The National Weather Service extended a flood warning for Union County Sunday morning due to stream levels in Summit, Plainfield, Linden and Elizabeth, but that has since been canceled. Officials have also been monitoring the level of the Rahway River throughout the storm. Reports indicate that the river rose as high as 8 feet in the early hours of Sunday, but is now steadily falling. The flood stage is 5.5 feet.

The worst of the storm passed over Scotch Plains-Fanwood Saturday evening, flooding many local roads and overwhelming residents' sump pumps, resulting in basement flooding.

Both Scotch Plains and Fanwood police reported receiving numerous calls from residents seeking assistance with home flooding.

Several roads, including portions of North Avenue in Fanwood and West Broad Street in Scotch Plains, were shut down. The portion of Route 22 running through Scotch Plains was also shut down due to flooding.

The forecast for Sunday calls for a chance of rain and thunderstorms, with additional rainfall amounts between a tenth and a quarter of an inch. Periods of rain could continue throughout the evening and into Monday.