In many areas of New Jersey this week, it feels like hot air blowing from a furnace outside as our third heat wave of the summer is blasting us with temperatures as high as 95 to 99 degrees — without the humidity factored in.
We could even see some 100-degree readings Tuesday afternoon.
While triple-digit temperatures are not the norm in our region of the nation, the Garden State is no stranger to sizzling summer heat that occasionally soars into the low 100s.
How steamy can it get?
The mercury once rose as high as 110 degrees in New Jersey, back in July 1936. That continues to stand as the hottest temperature ever recorded in the Garden State, according to the office of the New Jersey State Climatologist at Rutgers University, which maintains weather records dating back to 1895.
The 110-degree scorcher was recorded at a weather reporting station in the Runyon section of Old Bridge in Middlesex County. And by all accounts, that was the actual air temperature — not the “real-feel” heat index reading.
New Jersey almost reached that brutally high temperature 13 years ago. That’s when the thermometer at Newark Liberty International Airport spiked to 108 degrees on July 22, 2011, during an intense summer heat wave.
On the same day in 2011, the mercury at Trenton Mercer Airport in Ewing hit 106 degrees, according to data from the National Weather Service. That turned out to be the second time on record that Trenton reached that steamy mark. The first was July 9, 1936.
This chart shows the hottest temperatures ever recorded at Newark Liberty International Airport in Essex County since 1931.Len Melisurgo | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
Atlantic City’s all-time record high is also 106 degrees, set on June 28, 1969, according to weather service records.
New Brunswick in Middlesex County, one of the state’s oldest weather monitoring sites, has two days of 106-degree temperatures listed in its record books: One on July 2, 1901, and one on Aug. 7, 1918. The city also had five days that sizzled to 105 degrees. (Those were in July 2011, July 2010, July 1936, July 1901 and July 1898.)
Farther north, in Paterson in Passaic County, the temperature hit 106 degrees on Sept. 3, 1953, 105 degrees on July 5, 1949 and 104 degrees on Aug. 7, 1918, according to a report by NorthJersey.com. Bergenfield in Bergen County recorded a temperature of 105 degrees on July 6, 2010, and Cedar Grove in Essex County hit 104 on the same day.
This chart shows the hottest temperatures ever recorded in the Trenton area of Mercer County since 1865.Len Melisurgo | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
Forecasters say Newark — which hit 100 degrees once during a seven-day heat wave in June 2024 — has a shot at reaching triple digits again on Tuesday, July 16.
On Monday, one New Jersey town, Hamilton in Mercer County, reached 100 degrees, with several towns and cities hitting 98 and two places (Cream Ridge in Monmouth County and Fort Dix in Ocean County) reaching 99 degrees, according to data from the Rutgers NJ Weather Network.
Temperatures that high are considered dangerously hot, especially when combined with high humidity, and they could cause heat exhaustion or heat strokes.
This chart shows the hottest temperatures ever recorded in the Atlantic City area of Atlantic County since 1943.Len Melisurgo | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
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Note: Parts of this report were originally published in July 2022, with details updated on July 16, 2024.
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Len Melisurgo may be reached at LMelisurgo@njadvancemedia.com or on X at @LensReality.