Drought — San Juan Mountains, New Mexico

2018-06-01 to 2018-06-30 · San Juan Mountains, New Mexico

Event narrative

Exceptional drought conditions from May continued through June 2018. The Carson National Forest was closed during June 2018.

Wider weather episode

Widespread severe to extreme drought conditions at the end of May 2018 continued through June 2018. Severe drought conditions held steady at nearly 86 percent of the state, of which nearly 60 percent was deemed extreme drought or worse. Exceptional drought also held steady at 18 percent of New Mexico. The frequency of showers and thunderstorms with heavy rainfall increased across the state during June, especially across the eastern plains. A strong back door frontal boundary that shifted all the way to the Continental Divide at the beginning of June produced a bought of severe weather with pockets of heavy rainfall across central and western New Mexico. Several back door frontal intrusions into eastern New Mexico through the month produced several days of severe weather with locally heavy rainfall. The remnants of Hurricane Bud moved northeast across the state during the middle of June. This tropical system brought widespread beneficial rainfall to much of central and eastern New Mexico. Further improvements were made to drought conditions along the Texas border and southern portions of the state. Periodic red flag conditions continued to impact parts of New Mexico during June 2018 which aided several new fire starts. The Buzzard Fire in western Catron County grew to 50,000 acres through June. The Ute Park fire in Colfax County grew to over 30,000 acres in just two days in early June. Nearly the entire state was in stage two fire restrictions and several national forests and state lands were closed in June. The Animas River at Farmington recorded the lowest flow on record for late June dating back to 1990.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 754243. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.