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EF0 tornado in San Miguel County, New Mexico

Tornado May 26, 2025 · San Miguel County, New Mexico

EF0
Rating
1.2 mi
Path length
50 yd
Path width
EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 50 yards (0.03 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF0 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF0 is light damage: shingles and siding peeled, gutters torn, branches broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 65–85 mph. The rating comes from a survey of the worst damage after the storm, not from a wind measurement, so it says as much about what the tornado hit as about how strong it was.

What the National Weather Service wrote

Viewer near San Geronimo looking to the northeast observed a tornado in the distance.

The wider storm

Higher moisture moved into eastern New Mexico early on May 25th behind a backdoor cold front. This added moisture combined with lift ahead of a weakening upper low over Utah resulting in the development of scattered showers and storms along and east of the central mountain chain. Several of these storms became strong to severe with one producing quarter size hail near Tierra Monte in the east slopes of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and another producing a tornado near Floyd in western Roosevelt County and quarter to ping pong ball size hail between Cannon Air Force Base and downtown Clovis. Storms across eastern New Mexico mostly tapered off around sunset while the convectively enhanced backdoor front pushed west through the gaps of the central mountain chain.

Key Words: Severe Thunderstorm Winds, Large Hail, Tornado, Funnel Cloud.

Another round of showers and storms developed and moved across north central and eastern New Mexico during the afternoon and evening hours of May 26th due to higher surface moisture in place combining with added lift and instability from the upper level disturbance moving overhead. Penny to golf ball size hail was observed at several locations, a brief tornado was observed near Montezuma northeast of Las Vegas, and damaging straight line winds resulted in a flipped and overturned an 18-wheeler trailer near Forrest in southern Quay County. Storms exited east into Texas around sunset.

Began near Montezuma (35.6500, -105.3200).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

1 more tornado the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

EF1 Roosevelt County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 1249291. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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