textproduct: El Paso

KEY MESSAGES

Updated at 1002 PM MDT Sat May 23 2026

- Dry weather Saturday and Sunday. Slight warmup over the Memorial Day weekend, with lowland highs in the lower 90s.

- Scattered showers and thunderstorms will be possible on Memorial Day, with lingering chances Tuesday over the Sacramento Mountains. Storms will be capable of sudden rain and gusty outflow winds.

- Dry southwest flow aloft will keep skies mostly clear Wednesday through Saturday, with seasonable temperatures.

DISCUSSION

Issued at 1002 PM MDT Sat May 23 2026

Old upper low near Baja that drifted east to near the Mexican Chihuahuan Desert has dissipated with little or no signs of life left on satellite imagery this evening. In its place, weak ridging aloft has developed over New Mexico/Arizona for tonight and Sunday. Moisture in terms of both dewpoint and PW, has continued to slowly decrease throughout today and tonight, but should start seeing a slight uptick on Sunday.

Upper low well off the northern Baja coast will start influencing the area starting Sunday as it nears the Baja. As mentioned above, dewpoints do rise slightly, and several hi-res models show isolated thunderstorms popping up over the mountains Sunday afternoon. Then lead short-wave out ahead of the low approaches far southwest NM late afternoon into the evening on Sunday, giving the NM Bootheel a slight chance of thunderstorms later Sunday evening. Thus will tailor grid POPs with this in mind.

Monday looks better area wide for rain chances as the upper low rotates into Arizona and the sub-tropical jet lifts northward to just south of the CWA. Modest moisture increases, the east from the Gulf of America, and the west from the eastern Pacific, so that dewpoints are back into the upper 30s and 40s. CAPE values increase to around 300-700 J/kg and PWs rise as high as .80 inches. So rain/storm chances increase area wide; not much shear to write home about, but the CAPE values suggest a few storms could become strong in the east. For areas from the RG Valley east the window for rain looks to be Monday afternoon and evening. For areas to the west the window is smaller-likely just the afternoon as the sub-tropical jet brings dry-slotting just north of it into the western CWA. Dry-slotting overtakes most of the CWA Tuesday, but enough moisture lingers around in the far east so Otero/Hudspeth Counties could still see an afternoon thunderstorm.

Wednesday through Saturday...upper low exits to our northwest Wednesday as next Pacific low moves in over Nevada. The low moves very slowly, still over the northern Rockies by Saturday. Hence dry southwest flow around this low will persist over our area. Temperatures will remain seasonable. GFS does show small break-off low moving to just south of Arizona Saturday, drawing the dry-line into the eastern CWA and suggesting a chance of thunderstorms. However the GFS appears to be the outlier as the ECMWF/CMC give very little attention to this feature.

AVIATION

(12Z TAFS) Issued at 510 AM MDT Sun May 24 2026

VFR conditions expected through the period with skies SKC. Skies will become FEW to SCT at 10-15 kft. Winds will be light and VRB through the morning, becoming south at 7-12 knots.

FIRE WEATHER

Issued at 510 AM MDT Sun May 24 2026

Near-elevated to elevated fire weather conditions can be expected for today as dry air remains locked in over the region. Min RH values this afternoon will drop to less than 15 percent areawide with high temperatures slightly above average. With ridge building in aloft, the surface pressure gradient will remain relax with light to low-end breezy winds this afternoon. Deep afternoon mixing will promote very good smoke ventilations rates.

For Monday, the next upper level system will race west to east across the Desert SW. Ahead of the advancing system moisture will work in across the area. As the aforementioned upper level system move closer to the local area, increasing upper level dynamics, along with increasing convective parameters will overlay the area. Scattered to numerous showers and thunderstorms can be expected Monday afternoon and evening. The primary threat with storm development will be gusty outflow winds and lightning. Min RH values on Monday will increase to above 15 percent areawide.

Dry southwest flow regime will set back up across the region through the remainder of the work week with the return of daily elevated fire weather conditions.

PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS

El Paso 71 91 61 87 / 0 50 60 0 Sierra Blanca 60 88 54 83 / 0 60 90 20 Las Cruces 61 87 52 85 / 0 50 60 0 Alamogordo 63 89 54 82 / 0 60 70 30 Cloudcroft 47 69 41 62 / 10 70 80 60 Truth or Consequences 63 83 56 82 / 0 60 50 40 Silver City 57 78 50 78 / 0 60 20 10 Deming 61 90 54 89 / 0 30 30 0 Lordsburg 61 86 54 86 / 20 50 10 0 West El Paso Metro 69 89 61 86 / 0 50 60 0 Dell City 59 91 55 82 / 0 60 90 50 Fort Hancock 67 95 59 90 / 0 60 80 10 Loma Linda 63 85 55 80 / 0 60 60 10 Fabens 66 93 58 88 / 0 50 60 0 Santa Teresa 63 88 55 86 / 0 40 50 0 White Sands HQ 71 89 61 85 / 0 60 70 20 Jornada Range 57 87 49 84 / 0 50 50 20 Hatch 62 89 53 88 / 0 40 40 10 Columbus 67 90 59 90 / 10 20 10 0 Orogrande 58 88 51 82 / 0 60 70 20 Mayhill 52 80 46 72 / 10 60 80 80 Mescalero 50 78 45 72 / 10 80 80 60 Timberon 49 76 43 69 / 10 70 90 50 Winston 52 75 44 74 / 0 70 50 60 Hillsboro 62 82 54 81 / 0 40 40 30 Spaceport 55 85 47 83 / 0 50 50 30 Lake Roberts 47 78 43 79 / 0 70 30 20 Hurley 57 81 48 82 / 0 50 10 0 Cliff 47 84 49 85 / 10 80 20 10 Mule Creek 41 80 44 81 / 30 80 20 0 Faywood 59 81 50 81 / 0 40 30 0 Animas 60 87 54 86 / 20 30 0 0 Hachita 61 87 54 86 / 10 30 10 0 Antelope Wells 60 88 55 86 / 20 20 0 0 Cloverdale 58 82 54 80 / 20 10 0 0

EPZ WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

TX...None. NM...None.