Unusually dry, warmandwindy weather helped trigger a rash of wildfires across the region Monday, causing traffic and transit problems, consuming hundreds of acres of forest in South Jersey and forcing evacuations on Long Island.
The weather for the next four days is set to warm up following a spell of cool, windy conditions in practice and should help scoring, alleviating the feeling in some quarters that the event has lost its magic following two years of harsh weather allied to a toughening up of the course.