Drought — Chuska Mountains, New Mexico

2020-09-01 to 2020-09-30 · Chuska Mountains, New Mexico

Event narrative

Severe drought conditions from August 2020 continued in September.

Wider weather episode

Drought conditions across northern and central New Mexico continued to deteriorate during the month of September 2020. As one of the worst monsoon seasons on record came to end, moderate to extreme drought worsened to nearly 100 percent of the state of which 40 percent was deemed as extreme to exceptional drought. An anomalous early season winter storm brought high terrain snow and rain to most of the area during the first week of September. Precipitation totals across central and western New Mexico generally ranged from half an inch to three quarters an inch while precipitation totals neared an inch across north central and northeast New Mexico. Portions of the higher terrain of south central New Mexico fared better with totals generally near an inch and a half. Despite this, the second half of the month was mostly dry with more record heat which contributed to the worsening drought.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 914615. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.