Tularosa's Wind and Hail storm of May 2008

Preliminary Hail and Wind Storm report for May 28th 2008

Take a video tour of Tularosa that highlights some of the damage locations via Google Earth

The dry line backed across southern New Mexico and Far West Texas early Wednesday morning. Below is an image of the approximate location of the dry line this afternoon. Higher dewpoint air that gives fuel to thunderstorms was east of the Rio Grande River.

Strong thunderstorms developed along the dry line in the late afternoon. At around 4:30 PM a super cell thunderstorm developed over central Otero County. This storm split and sent two hail storms, a smaller one into Alamogordo and a much larger one into Tularosa New Mexico.

Early reports from Tularosa indicated that one mobile home had been destroyed by high winds. Five homes had sustained moderate damage from the strong winds and that 500 homes had sustained minor damaged due to the large hail and winds.

Meteorologist-in-Charge of the El Paso NWS Office, Bill Alexander, toured Tularosa the next day and below is a summary of his storm report:

Based on the evidence, this incident likely occurred in conjunction with a wet microburst (downburst), accompanied by heavy hail fall at its core, with divergent west wind at the south fringe and south wind along its northern boundary. The most intense SSW wind existed at the core of the downburst between W. 1st and W. 6th Streets and bounded on the west by Railroad and on the east by La Luz, west of downtown Tularosa. For Bill's complete report download this Word document.

Below are some links to pictures and one video of the hail damage.

Hail Video - video courtesy Zach Dansby HAFB (big file)

Pic 1 - photo courtesy Debbie Betscher in ALM

Pic 2 - photo courtesy Debbie Betscher in ALM

Pic 3 - photo courtesy Zach Dansby HAFB

Pic 4 - photo courtesy Zach Dansby HAFB

Pic 5 - photo courtesy Zach Dansby HAFB

Pic 6 - photo courtesy Karen Reyes in Tularosa (big file)

Pic 7 - photo courtesy Karen Reyes in Tularosa (big file)

Pic 8 - photo courtesy Karen Reyes in Tularosa (big file)

Pic 9 - photo courtesy Karen Reyes in Tularosa (big file)

Pic 10 - photo courtesy Karen Reyes in Tularosa (big file)

Pic 11 - photo courtesy Bill Alexander NWS-ELP in Tularosa

Pic 12 - photo courtesy Bill Alexander NWS-ELP in Tularosa

Pic 13 - photo courtesy Bill Alexander NWS-ELP in Tularosa

Pic 14 - photo courtesy Bill Alexander NWS-ELP in Tularosa

Pic 15 - photo courtesy Bill Alexander NWS-ELP in Tularosa