Thunderstorm Wind in Socorro County, New Mexico

A severe thunderstorm resulted in a peak wind gust of 83 mph at the Chupadera RAWS on the White Sands Missile Range.

The monsoon high was centered over the Arizona and New Mexico border July 8th. Daytime heating combined with rich Gulf moisture along the east slopes of the Sacramento Mountains resulted in the development of thunderstorms over the west end of the South Fork burn scar during the early afternoon. These storms trained slowly across the South Fork burn scar into midtown Ruidoso. Between 1.5 to 3.5 inches of rainfall was observed on the burn scar along with up to 1.5 inches of rainfall in the Village of Ruidoso. Significant to catastrophic flash flooding and debris flows were observed across the burn scar and on the Rio Ruidoso all the way downstream to the Ruidoso Downs horse racetrack and casino. With the extremely high rainfall amounts and debris runoff, the Rio Ruidoso at Hollywood rose from 1.43 feet to major and new record flood stage of 20.24 feet in approximately 30 minutes! This replaced the previous record of 15.86 feet set back on July 20th, 2024 which was also due to burn scar flash flooding and debris flows. Flash flooding and debris flows subsided during the early to mid evening hours.