Overview
- A roughly 50-foot section of the store’s roof gave way and sent water and debris into the BJ’s Wholesale Club on Route 35 in Ocean Township, with heavy local flooding reported.
- Emergency crews accounted for all 27 people who were inside the store, and two individuals who were briefly partially trapped freed themselves and exited without injury.
- A multi-agency response used interior drones, urban search-and-rescue K-9 teams and secondary searches to confirm no remaining victims and to secure reported utility hazards.
- The store remains closed indefinitely while authorities review security-camera footage, complete utility safety checks and schedule structural-engineer inspections to judge repairability.
- The collapse follows days of severe storms that dropped multiple inches of rain across Monmouth County, and officials have urged the public to avoid Route 35 and nearby areas as operations continue.