WATCH: Lack Of 'Steering Currents' Led To Flash Flooding

For a couple of hours Thursday, rain fell in gushes in and wind whipped trees in a way that reminded some of Hurricane Sandy.

But only in a few small areas. While some readers were posting photos and even video (see below) of the flooding, others were reacting with surprise to the flooding reports.

The southeastern portion of Toms River got 5 inches of rain between 3 and 5 p.m., state climatologist David A. Robinson told the Asbury Park Press.

That caused flash flooding that inundated Route 37 and stranded nearly 30 motorists in water that was a couple of feet deep in some places, said Ralph Stocco, spokesman for the Toms River Police Department. None of the situations was life-threatening, he said.

Cars were stuck in jughandles and on a number of side streets, with water flooding Garfield Avenue, Fischer Boulevard and Harding Avenue and Coolidge Avenue all impacted, police reports said.

Robinson told the Asbury Park Press that the localized impact of the storm was due to a couple of factors.

He said boundaries in the atmosphere arise from time to time, and as a result “you develop this intense, very isolated storm and it just didn’t have much in the way of steering currents, so it sat in place.”

“So it was intense and it was very slow-moving and that resulted in localized torrential rains and associated flash flooding,” Robinson told the Press.

Rainfall totals included 5.24 inches and 4.6 inches in southeastern Toms River, 2.54 inches in the southeast corner of Berkeley, 2.76 inches in Pine Beach, 2.37 inches in Seaside Heights, he said.

(Cars float down the street on Vaughn Avenue in Toms River, where flash flooding from a localized intense storm filled roads including part of Route 37 with water. Photo by Kristine Holtz)