Looking South At Guadalupe Peak From The Rim On 540 South Of Queen.

Hot Wx To Stick Around!

Hobbs tied their record high temperature for the date yesterday when they hit 103, their old record was 103 set in 2001. 

Not much change is anticipated in the overall setup across SE NM the next couple of days. Afternoon highs will continue to range from 100-105 with overnight lows in the upper 60's to the low 70's. Long-range models continue to indicate triple digit temperatures into the first of next week.

A few isolated thunderstorms may pop up over the Guadalupe Mountains this afternoon and evening. There is a very slight chance that one or two of these may drift out over the Eddy County Plains this evening....but don't get your hopes up too high.

Widely scattered thunderstorms are forecast for most of the the week over the Sacramento and Captain Mountains. A weak cold front will attempt to push southward into SE NM by the end of the week. This will bring slightly higher chances of a few thunderstorms and maybe five degrees of cooling....but this is pretty uncertain at this time as well.

RAIN!

RAIN!

Roy Lawson Sent This To Me Today Via An Email. Roy & I Went To School Together In Artesia.

I Do Not Know Where He Got This From...If You Recognize This-

 Please Send Me The Info On The Video So I Can Give The Proper Credit To Whom Is Due.

WendellMalone@plateautel.net

Close Up View Of The Rain Free Base & Wall Cloud With Funnels

Classic Ragged SE NM Wall Cloud

Rain Free Base-Wall Cloud-With Double Funnel Clouds

Rain Free Base With A Wall Cloud

Mature Fat Funnel Cloud

Skinny Rope Type Funnel Cloud-Dissipating Stage

Click On The Images To Enlarge Them

At 6:13 PM MDT this afternoon Chaves County Skywarn Storm Chaser Steven Johnson shot these amazing photos of a tornadic supercell thunderstorm that was located 9 miles NE of Arabela in Lincoln County New Mexico, or 38 miles NW of Roswell, NM in Chaves County.

The storm was moving south at 15 mph and Steven's reports along with the Cannon AFB Doppler Radar data prompted the Albuquerque National Weather Service Forecast Office to issue a Tornado Warning on this storm. Job well done Steven!

Deep Solar Minimum Continues

"July has arrived and half of the year 2009 is now in the record books. On the surface June seemed to have so much promise but it is clear that we are still very deep in this extended solar minimum. 

If you are like me and keep an eye on the sunspot activity daily you were probably thinking things were finally turning a corner. Perhaps they are but June wasn't it. I thought a few solar disturbances lacking a true spot were being called a spot during the month. Now that the official sunspot number for June has been released that appears to be the case. At the end of the day on the 30th I had seen the unofficial sunspot number listed at 6.6. The official number was significantly lower at 2.6. 

The sunspot number isn't the only solar indicator that remains very low. The solar flux was the lowest it had been in over half a year at 68.6. I think this is a good indication that the sun remains very stable and that this solar minimum will continue for what could be a very long time. 

Just how deep is this solar minimum? We now have 18 consecutive months with a sunspot number below 10. You have to go back to the solar minimum of 1911 to find an equal. We aren't experiencing a never before seen minimum. We just haven't seen one this deep in 90 years. Minimums of this nature were a bit more typical during the 1800's. I will include a link to the data so you can see for yourself."

Historical Sunspot Data: