textproduct: Albuquerque

KEY MESSAGES

Updated at 129 AM MDT Fri Mar 13 2026

- A risk of rapid fire spread will continue over the central highlands this afternoon before expanding across most areas this weekend.

- A damaging wind event looks increasingly likely this weekend with many locations experiencing strong to damaging wind gusts late Saturday into Sunday.

- A strong area of high pressure will move over the region going into the middle of next week, likely resulting in record warmth for March.

SHORT TERM

(Today through Saturday) Issued at 129 AM MDT Fri Mar 13 2026

Northwest flow aloft will continue today, but speeds are already showing signs of decreasing in NM. The lee-side surface trough from yesterday is dropping southeastward, and this will introduce a weak northeasterly wind shift to portions of the northeastern to east central plains during the mid to late morning. However, by afternoon, a new weaker lee-side surface trough will be taking shape over southeastern CO and northeastern NM. The 700 mb wind speeds again look to be a good proxy for the highest gust potential today. Although, with a few degrees of warming, we should mix slightly higher than 700 mb this afternoon. Therefore, a swath extending from the Four Corners southeastward into central zones would likely reach 20 to 30 kt gusts with lighter speeds elsewhere. The dry and gusty conditions will increase the risk of fire spread today, mostly in the central highlands. Daytime highs in the 60's, 70's, and 80's will be common today with the south central to southeastern valleys being the warmest. Many locales will climb 15 to 18 degrees above normal for mid March today.

On Saturday, the day will start with a shortwave trough moving over the Puget Sound, but by the end of the day this feature will be rapidly deepening into a longer wave trough and gaining quickly on the central Rockies. While westerly winds aloft over NM will start out relatively light, speeds will be surging up by late afternoon with a vast lee-side trough deepening over eastern CO and surrounding high plains states. This will bring a late afternoon speed surge to the surface with widespread breezy to windy conditions before sunset with gusts of 30 to 40 mph being common (potentially closer to 50 mph over the northern mountains). Temperatures will keep gaining a few more degrees Saturday with most of the northern and central NM forecast area observing daytime highs of 15 to 22 degrees above normal.

LONG TERM

(Saturday night through Thursday) Issued at 129 AM MDT Fri Mar 13 2026

Into Saturday night, the base of the trough will move into eastern CO, just clipping northern NM. The cold pool aloft will be significant, but the core (-10 to -20 C at 700 mb) of it will largely stay north of the NM-CO border with some of this air only sagging into northern and northeastern zones of NM. The winds, however, will surge up with 700 mb speeds modeled to reach 50 to 70 kt on a fairly widespread basis, and the surface gradient will also be quite impressive as the Pacific front sweeps in Saturday night and Sunday morning. This will keep gusty winds going all night across much of northern and central NM with sheltered valleys just observing breeziness while exposed high ridges and peaks get buffeted by higher gusts of 40 to potentially 70 mph.

The backdoor segment of the front will spill into eastern NM through the mid to late morning Sunday where dense packing of the isobars will keep very windy conditions going while cold, dry air advection ensues. A couple of deterministic models hint at some light precip over far southeastern CO and far northeastern NM early Sunday morning, but this is hard to buy into, given the large dewpoint depressions that will persist, even as temperatures plummet behind the front. Surface dewpoints will also crater (many areas are shown to drop 10 to 20 degrees F below 0). The latest model consensus is for the cold air advection Sunday to be stronger with much of the northern half of NM actually dropping just slightly below normal with bigger deficits in far northeastern zones. However, winds will still take more notice in the sensible weather department with many zones projected to reach gusts of 50 to 60 mph with locally higher speeds in select highland zones Sunday. A myriad of Wind Advisories and High Wind Warnings will likely be needed, and a High Wind Watch could be coming over the next couple of shifts if current trends hold.

Into Sunday night and early Monday morning, the surface high is still shown to drop southward over the OK/TX panhandles and then quickly over the Permian Basin. This will briefly push an east wind into the Rio Grande valley while spreading more below normal temperatures (just by 5 to 15 degrees) across additional eastern plains zones on Monday. Surface winds would gradually veer in the plains Monday, turning moderately breezy by the afternoon while gusty northwesterlies persist in northwestern to central zones.

The extended weather pattern has not altered much, still getting warm to ridiculously hot for March over the southwestern states as an anomalously strong ridge of high pressure (heights of 590-594 decameters at 500 mb) builds Tuesday through the end of next week. Forecasted daytime highs for Wednesday and Thursday are undercutting the blended NBM mean projections by a few to several degrees, but would still shatter daily and monthly records. It is unthinkable to have to consider heat impacts (due to daytime highs in the 90's) in the month of March, prior to the Spring Equinox with limited sunlight duration and low (high) solar elevation (zenith).

AVIATION

(06Z TAFS) Issued at 1118 PM MDT Thu Mar 12 2026

Batches of high, cirrus clouds are moving over northern New Mexico currently, but Visual Flight Rules (VFR) conditions are forecast to prevail through the next 24 hours. Winds aloft are quite strong north of the Colorado border, but are lower in speed in New Mexico, generally at 10 to 30 kt at 10,000 ft MSL. This will lead to some surface gusts of 20 to 30 kt through the daytime Friday, mainly stretching from the Four Corners to the central parts of the state.

FIRE WEATHER

Issued at 129 AM MDT Fri Mar 13 2026

Wind speeds aloft are not modeled to be as high today, and this coupled with a less favorably oriented lee-side surface trough will lead to lower wind speeds at the surface/20 ft level today. However, a corridor of gusty conditions will still develop, mainly from the Four Corners southeastward to the central zones, and concerns for fire weather impacts remain highest over the central highlands (Zone 125) where gusts will be most prone to exceed 35 mph. Consequently, the Red Flag Warning will continue for this zone today.

An approaching Pacific trough and accompanying stout cold front are still causing fire weather concerns to escalate for the upcoming weekend. Confidence is highest for critical wind speeds over the central/northeastern highlands on Saturday, but there are concerns that critical winds could expand to the adjacent eastern plains and even the highlands of north central, northwestern, and west central NM late in the afternoon. Well above average temperatures, abysmally low humidity, and curing fine fuels are all primed for critical conditions, so it will just be a matter of wind speeds which are a bit more marginal outside of the central to northeastern highlands. For now, the Fire Weather Watch will stand as is for Saturday.

On Sunday, despite several degrees of cooling associated with a notable frontal passage, widespread critical fire weather is looming. Northeastern zones would cool into the 40's and 50's which would likely mitigate fire spread, but farther south and closer to the I-40 corridor, temperatures will not be as cool and could carry fire more readily. Regardless, winds will be very strong to severe with widespread gusts of 40 to 60 mph for most zones and higher speeds over select highland zones Sunday. Plummeting dewpoints (-10 to -20 F in several zones) will keep afternoon RH in the single digits, even after the effects of cool air advection.

Critical conditions could linger over northwestern and perhaps some central highland zones into Monday, but fortunately these would not be as widespread or as long in duration.

Winds still look to rapidly reduce as the incoming unseasonably strong ridge of high pressure grows over southwestern states Tuesday through the end of next week. Still, temperatures will soar well above normal and extremely low afternoon humidity will be observed each day. This will continue to cure many finer fuels.

PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS

Farmington...................... 71 36 76 39 / 0 0 0 0 Dulce........................... 68 26 70 31 / 0 0 0 0 Cuba............................ 67 33 71 37 / 0 0 0 0 Gallup.......................... 72 28 74 34 / 0 0 0 0 El Morro........................ 69 36 71 37 / 0 0 0 0 Grants.......................... 73 31 75 34 / 0 0 0 0 Quemado......................... 70 36 73 40 / 0 0 0 0 Magdalena....................... 73 43 76 47 / 0 0 0 0 Datil........................... 70 38 72 44 / 0 0 0 0 Reserve......................... 75 33 75 35 / 0 0 0 0 Glenwood........................ 78 38 77 37 / 0 0 0 0 Chama........................... 61 29 64 29 / 0 0 0 0 Los Alamos...................... 69 41 72 42 / 0 0 0 0 Pecos........................... 70 38 71 39 / 0 0 0 0 Cerro/Questa.................... 65 35 67 36 / 0 0 0 0 Red River....................... 55 31 57 29 / 0 0 0 0 Angel Fire...................... 62 24 64 25 / 0 0 0 0 Taos............................ 69 26 72 32 / 0 0 0 0 Mora............................ 70 36 72 37 / 0 0 0 0 Espanola........................ 75 34 78 44 / 0 0 0 0 Santa Fe........................ 69 41 72 43 / 0 0 0 0 Santa Fe Airport................ 72 36 75 43 / 0 0 0 0 Albuquerque Foothills........... 74 46 79 49 / 0 0 0 0 Albuquerque Heights............. 76 42 81 47 / 0 0 0 0 Albuquerque Valley.............. 78 39 83 47 / 0 0 0 0 Albuquerque West Mesa........... 76 41 81 49 / 0 0 0 0 Belen........................... 79 35 83 46 / 0 0 0 0 Bernalillo...................... 77 41 82 48 / 0 0 0 0 Bosque Farms.................... 78 35 82 44 / 0 0 0 0 Corrales........................ 77 41 82 48 / 0 0 0 0 Los Lunas....................... 78 36 83 47 / 0 0 0 0 Placitas........................ 73 44 78 47 / 0 0 0 0 Rio Rancho...................... 76 41 81 48 / 0 0 0 0 Socorro......................... 80 42 84 52 / 0 0 0 0 Sandia Park/Cedar Crest......... 70 42 73 44 / 0 0 0 0 Tijeras......................... 70 42 74 44 / 0 0 0 0 Edgewood........................ 72 38 75 44 / 0 0 0 0 Moriarty/Estancia............... 73 31 76 42 / 0 0 0 0 Clines Corners.................. 69 37 72 39 / 0 0 0 0 Mountainair..................... 71 39 75 43 / 0 0 0 0 Gran Quivira.................... 72 40 75 45 / 0 0 0 0 Carrizozo....................... 74 44 76 48 / 0 0 0 0 Ruidoso......................... 69 45 69 48 / 0 0 0 0 Capulin......................... 72 35 74 26 / 0 0 0 0 Raton........................... 76 32 78 34 / 0 0 0 0 Springer........................ 78 33 80 39 / 0 0 0 0 Las Vegas....................... 74 37 76 40 / 0 0 0 0 Clayton......................... 77 41 82 35 / 0 0 0 0 Roy............................. 75 38 80 42 / 0 0 0 0 Conchas......................... 82 37 87 47 / 0 0 0 0 Santa Rosa...................... 80 43 83 51 / 0 0 0 0 Tucumcari....................... 82 38 87 46 / 0 0 0 0 Clovis.......................... 82 43 86 50 / 0 0 0 0 Portales........................ 82 42 87 52 / 0 0 0 0 Fort Sumner..................... 83 41 87 52 / 0 0 0 0 Roswell......................... 88 43 92 51 / 0 0 0 0 Picacho......................... 81 44 84 52 / 0 0 0 0 Elk............................. 79 43 81 49 / 0 0 0 0

ABQ WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

Fire Weather Watch from Saturday afternoon through Saturday evening for NMZ101-104-105-109-120>125.

Red Flag Warning from noon today to 8 PM MDT this evening for NMZ125.