A last disturbance moving around a slow moving upper trough crossed southern New Mexico and brought wind gusts over 45 mph and blowing dust to the region.
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The episode as NWS EPZ wrote it up.
A last disturbance moving around a slow moving upper trough crossed southern New Mexico and brought wind gusts over 45 mph and blowing dust to the region.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS El Paso, TX wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at May 19, 11:10 AM MST, 2 hours 12 minutes earlier. Its key messages:
Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service El Paso TX/Santa Teresa NM
1210 PM MDT Mon May 19 2025
...New DISCUSSION, AVIATION, FIRE WEATHER...
.KEY MESSAGES...
- Another day of strong and gusty winds, and blowing dusts, as
our current Pacific storm system passes by.
- Strong winds and low humidity will lead to critical fire
weather conditions again this afternoon.
- Dry weather will persist from Tuesday as lowland temperatures
climb into the upper nineties to near 100 for Memorial Day
weekend.
- High pressure will allow for lighter winds after today, but
also brings warmer temperatures, with possible triple-digit
highs late this week.
&&
.DISCUSSION...
Issued at 1209 PM MDT Mon May 19 2025
An upper level trough was moving across northern New Mexico today
and that is helping to give us another day of strong and gusty
winds. Along with the winds we will see some blowing dust. The
blowing dust yesterday underperformed, but today's wind direction
is a little more from the west, so we will have to wait and see if
other dust sources become active this afternoon. As the trough
swings through and heads to the east, it will shift our west winds
to more of a northwest wind and the wind gusts will drop off
around midnight. After today, winds don't look like they will be
much of a player for our weather through the coming holiday
weekend. On Tuesday, with the trough to our east, we will have a
northwest flow aloft for a day. That will keep our high
temperatures a couple of degrees below average. But then the heat
starts.
On Wednesday our flow aloft will become more zonal (west to east)
which will allow our high temperatures to jump 3 to 5 degrees
above average. By Thursday, an upper level ridge will begin to
build across the region. While the upper level ridge is not that
strong it will allow our high temperatures to continue to rise, so
that by Thursday afternoon through Saturday, we will see high
temperatures in the mid to upper 90's across much of the lowlands.
We could see the first 100 degree temperature in El Paso and the
lower Rio Grande Valley of El Paso and Hudspeth Counties. This
does NOT look like the start of an extended run of hot weather.
Temperatures for the end of the week and into the first of the
weekend will run above average, but then by the start of next
week, temperatures will begin to trend back closer to seasonal
averages. We may even see rain chances back in the forecast for
parts of next week.
&&
.AVIATION...
(18Z TAFS)
Issued at 1209 PM MDT Mon May 19 2025
We will have another day with strong and gusty winds and areas of
blowing dust. I didn't hit the blowing dust too hard since
yesterday's blowing dust underperformed. We will monitor the dust
trends and amend if needed. The gusty winds will be more from the
west today and then from the northwest this evening as a week
pacific cold front moves across the region. The gusty winds will
drop off a little before midnight. For tonight we will have
generally light north winds. Our skies look to stay unlimited this
afternoon, evening and tonight.
&&
.FIRE WEATHER...
Issued at 1209 PM MDT Mon May 19 2025
Strong winds will combine with min RH's near 10% in the lowlands
to near 15% in area mountains to give us critical fire weather
conditions. Even drier air arrives for the middle of the week,
with min RH's of 3 to 6% in the lowlands and 7 to 10% in area
mountains. The good news is that we will see much lighter winds
after today. RH recoveries at night will be very poor, with some
lowland locations not getting back up to 20% Wednesday through the
end of the week. The dry weather will continues into this
weekend, but winds will stay below critical levels.
&&
.PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS...
El Paso 57 87 61 95 / 0 0 0 0
Sierra Blanca 51 83 56 91 / 0 0 0 0
Las Cruces 48 84 53 91 / 0 0 0 0
Alamogordo 50 83 52 92 / 0 0 0 0
Cloudcroft 34 62 41 69 / 0 0 0 0
Truth or Consequences 50 84 54 91 / 0 0 0 0
Silver City 44 80 49 85 / 0 0 0 0
Deming 48 88 52 93 / 0 0 0 0
Lordsburg 47 86 49 92 / 0 0 0 0
West El Paso Metro 57 85 61 94 / 0 0 0 0
Dell City 50 87 51 95 / 0 0 0 0
Fort Hancock 53 90 58 97 / 0 0 0 0
Loma Linda 52 80 58 88 / 0 0 0 0
Fabens 54 88 57 96 / 0 0 0 0
Santa Teresa 51 85 54 93 / 0 0 0 0
White Sands HQ 55 86 60 94 / 0 0 0 0
Jornada Range 45 85 49 92 / 0 0 0 0
Hatch 47 87 50 93 / 0 0 0 0
Columbus 54 87 55 94 / 0 0 0 0
Orogrande 50 82 52 90 / 0 0 0 0
Mayhill 39 76 44 82 / 0 0 0 0
Mescalero 37 73 44 80 / 0 0 0 0
Timberon 37 71 42 78 / 0 0 0 0
Winston 34 79 41 85 / 0 0 0 0
Hillsboro 45 86 52 91 / 0 0 0 0
Spaceport 44 84 49 92 / 0 0 0 0
Lake Roberts 37 81 44 86 / 0 0 0 0
Hurley 42 82 47 89 / 0 0 0 0
Cliff 42 87 47 92 / 0 0 0 0
Mule Creek 42 82 47 88 / 0 0 0 0
Faywood 46 82 51 87 / 0 0 0 0
Animas 48 88 52 95 / 0 0 0 0
Hachita 47 86 50 93 / 0 0 0 0
Antelope Wells 49 88 54 94 / 0 0 0 0
Cloverdale 50 82 54 89 / 0 0 0 0
&&
.EPZ WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
TX...Red Flag Warning until 9 PM MDT this evening for Texas Fire
Weather Zone 055 El Paso County- Texas Fire Weather Zone
056 Hudspeth County.
NM...Red Flag Warning until 9 PM MDT this evening for Capitan and
Sacramento Mountains/Lincoln NF/LNZ- South Central Lowlands
and Southern Rio Grande Valley/BLM/GLZ- Southwest Deserts
and Lowlands/Las Cruces BLM/GLZ- Southwest Mountains/Gila
NF/Apache NF/GLZ.
Wind Advisory until 8 PM MDT this evening for East Slopes
Sacramento Mountains Below 7500 Feet-Sacramento Mountains
Above 7500 Feet-West Central Tularosa Basin/White Sands-
West Slopes Sacramento Mountains Below 7500 Feet.
&&
FORECASTER...15-BriceThe national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
1 dust storm. Local standard time, as filed.
NM 549 closed at mile marker 17 due to zero visibility.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in New Mexico in 2025Every state in 2025This day in weather historyWarnings in New Mexico, May 2025
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 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 1266225.