Michael Harger This is a golf course: tornado damage in Paramus, N.J.They looked at radar maps. They studied tree-fall patterns. They tallied eyewitness accounts.
Finally, local weather officials reached a decision: tornado.
Packing 100-mile-an-hour winds, it tore across a park, cemetery, street and golf course in Paramus, N.J., on Monday afternoon.
It uprooted dozens of trees but did little other property damage and no injuries.
Locals suspected a tornado immediately, but the weather service took more than a day to confirm.
Tornadoes are a warm-weather thing, but they do occur in October and even November.
In New York City, October tornadoes have struck Queens (1985) and Staten Island (1995 and 2003).
One place you’re safe â€" so far â€" is Manhattan.
A tornado has not been recorded in Manhattan, in any month, since the weather service started keeping records.
Here’s what else you need to know for Thursday.
WEATHER
Here comes rain â€" plenty, through Friday night at least, with totals over an inch-and-a-half likely. Raw, too, with a high of just 62 today.
Minor coastal flooding and major umbrella action are expected.
No tornadoes, though.
COMMUTE
Subways: Fine so far. Click for latest status.
Rails: Fine so far. Click for L.I.R.R., Metro-North and New Jersey Transit status.
Roads: Click for traffic map or radio report on the 1s.
Alternate-side parking is in effect all week.
COMING UP TODAY
- Two former associates of John C. Liu, the comptroller and failed mayoral candidate, are sentenced in a fund-raising scheme.
- Bill de Blasio is endorsed by women’s rights groups.
- Joseph J. Lhota meets with the Partnership for New York City and the Orthodox Jewish group Agudath Israel of America.
- Register to vote. Tomorrow is the deadline for the November election. Click to register online. Or go to a place on this list. There’s also a registration event at Penn Station from 10 a.m. and 2 p.m.
- A “participatory budgeting†session seeks Park Slopers’ input on what to do with $1 million in discretionary money from the City Council. Old First Reformed Church, 6:30 p.m. [Free]
- The authors of “NYC 2040: Housing the Next One Million New Yorkers,†a book that recommends super-dense development in parts of the city, speak at Van Alen Books on West 22nd Street. 7 p.m. [Free]
- “Movement†is the theme of the latest MoMA Art Lab, the Museum of Modern Art’s programming for children, opening today.
- Gay Talese submits to an hour-long interview at N.Y.U.’s journalism school. 7 p.m. [Free]
- Comic Con gets underway at the Javits Center with a session on comics’ role in education. (Plus people in costumes.)
- For more events, see The New York Times Arts & Entertainment guide.
IN THE NEWS
- A Brooklyn hospital created a job for Bill de Blasio’s wife in 2005, when he was a City Councilman who helped get the hospital millions in city money. [New York Times]
- Dan Sandler, the ranting Bad Elmo of Times Square, was sentenced to one year for trying to extort $2 million from the Girl Scouts. [New York Times]
Joseph Burgess contributed reporting.
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