NM Border Air Quality Blog

May 13 to 16

Finally getting back to the blog. There are still problems with Blogger keeping past entries hidden. Not sure when they will fix it. I also was out near Capitan this past weekend with no internet connection.

May 13

Clear and warm temperatures. Mostly southeast winds today.

By the afternoon smoke could be seen drifting in from the north and west as the figure from the NOAA HMS map server below shows.

May 14
The NOAA HMS maps show southwest winds blowing the wildfire smoke plumes toward the northeast today.

May 15

I could see a few large fire smoke plumes in the evening looking north and south from Las Cruces.
Looking south at about 8 pm. This is likely smoke from the fire in Mexico along the western boundary of the state of Chihuahua.

Looking north from Las Cruces at about the same time. We had southwest winds aloft so this is probably from the Horeshoe 2 Fire in Arizona.

May 16

Today the NWS is calling for southwest winds from 20 to 22 mph with gusts up to 31 mph. A few high clouds covered the area but mostly sunny over our region. Today's RUC wind forecast at 6 pm is shown below. Highest winds are likely in the southwest corner of Hidalgo County which doesn't look good for the Horseshoe 2 Fire in that area.

The AQI forecast for today is showing good air quality for the whole state.

 

The smoke plume from the Horseshoe 2 Fire was clearly visible from all point in our region today. Below is a view from GOES visible at 7 pm.

 

The plume can be seen over the horizon in Las Cruces in this timelapse video. The plume shows up at the end of the day.

 

Higher winds are expected tomorrow with the possibility of wind blown dust.