Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Junior Jalen Mason is all focus on covering a receiver during the first of two-a-day practice session on a rainy Monday morning at Leon Williams Stadium.
A cold front from the north mixed with atmospheric moisture this weekend to bring some slightly off-season rain storms to eastern and southern New Mexico.
The first round of showers arrived Sunday afternoon between 3 and 6 p.m., with the second round beginning at 9 p.m. and lasting through the night, according to National Weather Service Meteorologist Clay Anderson.
The biggest local rainfall report came from an area two miles southwest of Portales, Anderson said, with 3.3 inches of rain recorded in a 24-hour period ending 7 a.m. Monday.
The weather created a few complications, most notably the closure Monday morning of a low-traveled section of South Roosevelt Road Q 1/2 between 18th Street and Roosevelt Road 7, said Roosevelt County Sheriff Malin Parker.
"That area floods pretty bad on rain days," Parker said. "Outside of that it was just a glorious rain sent from God."
Parker noted only a couple incidents of stranded motorists but no reports of injuries related to Sunday's weather.
A southbound outflow boundary - also known as a gust front - interacting with a higher-than-normal atmospheric moisture content are to account for the weekend weather, Anderson said.
NWS issued a Flash Flood Watch for east central and southeast New Mexico effective noon Monday through 6 a.m. today.
"With all the rain we had (Sunday) night in Curry and Roosevelt counties - once the grounds are completely saturated - it requires less additional rain to cause problems," Anderson said.
Forecasters expected more southbound thunderstorm activity in and around Clovis and Portales late Monday, with the atmosphere stabilizing again by 9 a.m. today.
"What we're dealing with is not really atypical," Anderson said. "My guess would be that (Sunday's rainfall) is probably a record, but it's certainly not abnormal to have some significant rainfall at the end of July and in early August."
NWS also issued an alert concerning an out-of-service radar device at Cannon Air Force Base.
The malfunction was a mechanical failure unrelated to Sunday's weather, said Cannon AFB Media Operations Chief Eric Pilgrim.
The radar device is owned by NWS but located at Cannon, Pilgrim said. An elevation motor installed on it July 24 stopped working over the weekend but should be repaired by the end of the week. In the interim, additional radar devices on base and satellite imagery will prevent any interruption in flight service or weather monitoring.
