Brick Blizzard by the Numbers: The Final Tally on Storm Response

Snowy streets in Brick’s Herbertsville section following the Feb. 22, 2026 blizzard. (Supplied Photo)

Brick officials compiled the final numbers from last week’s blizzard response, with the township having fielded just under 1,000 calls for service between the time snow began falling 5 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 22 and when emergency operations were being completed Tuesday, Feb. 24.

“We had a doozy last weekend,” said Mayor Lisa Crate, who said staff worked on 12-hour rotations both on the road and at town hall to manage the response.

The snow plowing itself involved 76 pieces of equipment between township employees and contractors, with Public Works staff responding to assigned locations. “Snow monitors” were also working to check to make sure “each road was plowed and plowed appropriately,” the mayor said.

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The township set up a “My Street Hasn’t Been Plowed” form on the municipal website, which drew 1,700 responses, Crate said, including some residents who curiously reported their streets had not been plowed before the snow actually began falling. Still, the form inputs went directly to supervisors at town hall, who directed crews to those locations to check.

The raw numbers from the storm included thousands of power outages, transformer fires, and a massive response by police, fire and EMS. The storm’s impact included:

• 8,229 related power outages (mainly in the Herbertsville and Laurelton substations).
• 65 down wires across town.
• 28 transformers on fire or arcing.
• 22 traffic lights out or malfunctioning.
• 832 total police, fire and EMS calls.
• 140 police area checks.
• 109 first aid calls.
• 53 separate alarms that required a police response.
• 38 fire calls.
• 29 motor vehicle crashes.
• 18 welfare checks performed by police.

“Not only is our DPW out plowing streets as needed, but each of these calls we need someone on hand to make sure police, fire and EMS can get there as well,” said Crate. “There’s a lot going on behind the scenes the entirety of the storm. We made sure the funding was available, made available and used as necessary during the storm.”

Snowy streets in Brick’s Herbertsville section following the Feb. 22, 2026 blizzard. (Supplied Photo)

For the next storm – which hopefully won’t come until next winter – the township will have even more plowing assets on hand. The township council last week approved contracts with three new private companies – Marlin Construction, Meco Inc., and Montana Construction Group – to be added to the permanent list of contractors. The new contracts came after the township, earlier in February, raised its hourly rate for private plow companies depending on the types of equipment they use, as explained in the graphic below:

Screenshot

The township, in addition to the new contractors, had four private firms in place already.