NM Border Air Quality Blog

Nov. 21 - HIGH WIND DUST EVENT - As of 3 pm a wind blown dust event is happening in southern NM. We see high PM at the Anthony, Sunland Park, Chaparral, and Deming NMED monitoring sites. Winds across the region are high as seen in the 2:33 pm MST surface map.

 

The NWS issued a wind advisory for the Sacramento Mountains today. Recall that winds need to be at least 35 mph to have an advisory issued. Lowland winds are projected to be in the 20 to 30 mph range with gusts as high as 37 mph.

As of 10 pm, much of the wind has decreased except for a few places.The sites in southern Dona Ana county had the largest wind blown dust today. PM10 concentrations were highest at Sunland Park City Yard and Anthony. Peak hourly PM10 at the City Yard reached 615 µg/m3 today.

 

Sunland Park City Yard and Santa Teresa had the highest peak PM2.5. The PM2.5 at Anthony was higher throughout the day than the other sites. Peak PM2.5 at the City Yard reached 32 µg/m3 this afternoon.

Based on the raw hourly data from the NMED website there wasn't an exceedance of the NAAQS.