Today will be a wonderful Wednesday of weather with plenty of sunshine and warmer temperatures across New Mexico. A few upper level clouds are streaming over far northern New Mexico/southern Colorado, but other that blue skies are expected all day. A southerly breeze will pick up this afternoon, gusts only up to 30 mph, ushering in warmer air from Mexico into the state. Everyone will be 5-25° warmer today compared to yesterday.
A storm system is approaching the the state today, arriving to New Mexico Thursday. A strong upper level jet will set up directly over the state, from southwest to northeast Thursday afternoon. This will allow very strong to potentially damaging gusts up to 70 mph across the central and eastern parts of the state. Still windy elsewhere will gusts 50-55 mph. These winds will likely pick up blowing dust (mainly 1 PM – 7 PM) and create an elevated to critical fire danger across Central and Eastern New Mexico.
To the north, light valley rain and high elevation snow will begin move over the Four Corners and southern Colorado Thursday afternoon. It will move east over the Northern Mountains by Thursday evening, with light snow north and possibly over the East Mountains overnight and into early Friday morning. Significantly lesser snowfall totals compared to recent storms.
By Friday afternoon, clouds and precipitation will dissipate, allowing for drier and sunnier conditions. It will be significantly less windy but still breezy with gusts up to 30-35 mph. It will also be a lot cooler statewide by about 5-15° in the afternoon. Clouds will build over the state late Friday night into Saturday. Warming temperatures will persist Saturday, and even warmer into Sunday as a breeze picks up once again. More breezy to windy days lie ahead now that we are heading into Spring, also leading to elevated fire danger south and east.
