Confirmed: EF2 Tornado With 115 MPH Winds Plowed Across Long Beach Island

Cops in one Long Beach Island community say a possible tornado damaged at least 35 homes and boats Thursday night.

The Long Beach Township Police Department says they received three 9-1-1 calls for assistance from the High Bar Harbor neighborhood at about 9:20 Thursday night just as a line of intense thunderstorms moved through. Responding officers found four utility poles that were damaged and multiple houses that had their roofs blown off in and around Antioch Rd., Arnold Blvd., Collier Avenue, and Sunset Blvd.

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Police say three people were treated at the scene for lacerations, several residents were taken to the Barnegat Light Firehouse for shelter, and at least 35 houses and multiple boats were damaged.

Numerous agencies responded to the scene to provide assistance, including the Harvey Cedars, Ship Bottom, and Surf City Police Departments, the Ocean County Sheriff’s Department, and New Jersey State Marine Police.

Cops say power has been restored to the area except to about 15 homes that suffered extensive damage.

Officials with the National Weather Service office in Mt. Holly will be busy Friday investigating damage across the entire middle portion of the Garden State. As many as four tornadoes touched down Thursday afternoon and night causing wide swathes of damage in one of the wildest outbreaks of severe weather in recent memory.

A forecaster at the National Weather Service told the Townsquare News Network they are most interested in going to the Hopewell and Trenton areas, the Lakehurst area, the Barnegat Township and Harvey Cedars area in Ocean County, and the Willingboro and Mount Holly region of Burlington County.

Townsquare Media's Chief Meteorologist Dan Zarrow said about the storms, "I seriously haven't covered a severe weather outbreak like this since I worked in Oklahoma 13+ years ago."

With reporting from Townsquare Media's Dan Alexander.