A more active weekend is shaping up with increasing chances for rain and mountain snow. A cold front Sunday night will bring more rain chances and lower snow levels.
It has been a warmer day for most of New Mexico Friday thanks to the return of more sunshine. However, a weak backdoor cold front has kept parts of eastern and northeastern New Mexico over 10° cooler. Overnight, clouds will begin to return to southern New Mexico with a few spotty showers in far southern parts of the state.
Our weather becomes more active beginning Saturday morning as scattered showers and storms move into northwest New Mexico. These showers will move east into the afternoon, bringing the best chance for rain across the northern half of the state, with isolated thunderstorms in southern New Mexico. Scattered showers and isolated storms will move into Albuquerque beginning early Saturday afternoon. We will also see mountain snow in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. Most of the rain and mountain snow will come to an end late Saturday night, but spotty showers and mountain flurries will continue.
More scattered showers and mountain snow will develop through Sunday morning as the second round of this weekend’s storm begins. The best chances for rain and mountain snow will stay along and north of I-40 Sunday, until a strong cold front moves south through the state late Sunday evening. Colder air will lower snow levels down to valley floors across the northern half of New Mexico by Monday morning, with snow possible around Santa Fe, Las Vegas, the East Mountains, Estancia Valley, down to the Sacramento Mountains and in western parts of the state. Rain will also return Monday morning to the Albuquerque Metro and eastern New Mexico, before the moisture wraps up Monday afternoon. Snow accumulations will be light if any at all in the lower elevations, but the there could be 6″ above 10,000′ in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains.
Drier weather returns Monday night and will stick with us through Thanksgiving as a slow warming trend with bring temperatures back to around average by the holiday.
