A slow moving upper level low inched eastward across northern New Mexico between the 16th and the 18th of April. By early morning on the 17th, portions of the Northern Mountains and Northeast Highlands had already received a couple inches of snow.
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
The episode as NWS ABQ wrote it up.
A slow moving upper level low inched eastward across northern New Mexico between the 16th and the 18th of April. By early morning on the 17th, portions of the Northern Mountains and Northeast Highlands had already received a couple inches of snow. Snow spread southward across the Sandia Mountains during the afternoon and quickly dropped several inches of snow. Occasional rounds of thundersnow during the period resulted in locally higher amounts.
4 heavy snow. Local standard time, as filed.
Widespread snows of 3 to 7 inches were reported across the Sangre De Cristo Mountains. However, thundersnow resulted in localized heavy snowfall near Gascon, where a trained spotter reported 13 inches. In addition, 8 inches of snow was reported northwest of Taos by a CoCoRaHS observer.
A CoCoRaHS observer reported 9.5 inches near El Porvenir, or about 8 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Thundersnow attributed to the high snowfall amounts in the northern appendage of the Central High Plains.
Though many locations across the Northwest Mountains above 7500 feet only received between 3 and 7 inches of snow, similar amounts were also observed below 7500 feet. Spotters in Los Alamos estimate around 5 inches of snow fell.
The heaviest snow fell during the afternoon and evening hours of the 17th and it piled up quickly. Between 4 and 7 inches of snowfall was reported across the Sandia and Manzano Mountains. Some totals include 7 inches 10 miles south of Tijeras, 5.5 inches 6 miles northeast of Cedar Crest and 4.5 inches 5 miles east-southeast of Sandia Park.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in New Mexico in 2009Every state in 2009This day in weather historyWarnings in New Mexico, April 2009
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-10-01. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 154704, 154706, 154703, 154705.