Lightning — Santa Fe, New Mexico

2016-08-07 · near Agua Fria, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Event narrative

A lightning strike in Albuquerque at the Ladera and Unser transfer station resulted in a massive power outage across central New Mexico leaving roughly 135,000 customers without power. During this outage, a motorcyclist that was stopped at a dark traffic light in Santa Fe was rear-ended by another vehicle and killed.

Wider weather episode

Abundant moisture and strong afternoon heating resulted in another round of numerous showers and thunderstorms with localized torrential rainfall. Atmospheric winds were favorable for back-building thunderstorms to produce repeated rounds of torrential rainfall around the high terrain. Several thunderstorms ended up producing rainfall rates over 2 inches per hour. The heaviest rainfall occurred within Guaje Canyon near Los Alamos, to the west of Sapello within the Sapello River basin, around Mexican Springs north of Gallup, and near Zuni Pueblo and Black Rock. The only flash flooding that was observed occurred near Black Rock where water was surging over highway 53 in several different locations. Law enforcement closed the roadway at mile markers 14 and 17.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (35.6400, -106.0201)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 643385. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.