Drought — Southwest Mountains, New Mexico

2025-02-01 to 2025-02-28 · Southwest Mountains, New Mexico

Event narrative

Severe drought expanded to nearly all of the zone, while extreme drought was introduced to the southern portion of the zone.

Wider weather episode

February 2025 was a well above normal warm and dry month across New Mexico. The western two-thirds of the state saw temperature anomalies in the warmest 10 percent on record with some spots seeing their warmest February on record. This, alongside roughly two-thirds of the state see little to no precipitation exacerbated the return of moderate and severe drought across much of the western two-thirds of NM. Extreme drought was introduced into the far southwestern corner of Catron County.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1231056. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.