Wildfire in Southwest Mountains, New Mexico

The Iron Fire in the Gila National Forest in a very remote area of southern Catron County was discovered near noon on May 4th. It quickly expanded under critical fire weather conditions that day with a final mapped acreage of 482 acres. Cooler and wetter weather allowed the fire activity to wane with no further growth occurring after May 6th. No damage has been reported, although evacuations of several nearby campgrounds was ordered.

Abundant moisture pushed east to west across NM behind a strong cold front ahead of a strong upper level low approaching from AZ. The abundant moisture and favorable weather setup allowed for multiple days of strong to severe thunderstorms to develop across northern and central NM from May 4th through the 6th. Alongside all of this was unseasonably cold weather at higher elevations of the northern mountains. The Sangre de Cristo Mountains received 1 to 3 feet of snow at higher elevations above 9,500 feet. These high snow amounts ended up melting fairly quickly or succumbed to rain on snow events producing flooding impacts over portions of the east slopes of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains that lasted into May 8th.

Key Words: Heavy Snow, Severe Thunderstorms, River Flooding.