New Mexico village rebuilds all over again after record-breaking flash
flood kills 3
[July 10, 2025]
By MORGAN LEE, SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN and ROBERTO E. ROSALES
RUIDOSO, N.M. (AP) — The mountain village of Ruidoso returned to the
grim rituals of rebuilding after flash flooding and a deadly natural
disaster, just one year after wildfire and intense flooding reshaped the
popular vacation getaway and its surroundings.
Broken tree limbs, twisted metal, crumpled cars and muddy debris
remained as crews worked to clear roads and culverts in the wake of
Tuesday's flash flood that killed three people — including two children
— and significantly damaged as many as 50 homes, with one home carried
away entirely.
Tracy Haragan, a Ruidoso native on the verge of retirement, watched from
his home as a surging river carried away the contents of nine nearby
residences.
“You watched everything they owned, everything they had — everything
went down,” he said. “It is such a great town, it just takes a
tail-whipping every once in a while. ... We always survive.”
An intense bout of monsoon rains set the disaster in motion Tuesday.
Water rushed from the surrounding mountainside, overwhelming the Rio
Ruidoso and taking with it a man and two children from an RV park along
the river. The bodies were found downstream during search and rescue
efforts.
The children — a 4-year-old girl and a 7-year-old boy — had been camping
with their parents when they were swept away. The father and mother were
being treated for injuries at a hospital in Texas, according to
officials at Fort Bliss, where the father is stationed.
Mayor Lynn Crawford said hearts are broken over the lives lost and
stomachs are in knots as residents begin to take stock of the damage.
Rebuilding — again
A popular summer retreat, Ruidoso is no stranger to tragedy. It has
spent a year rebuilding following destructive wildfires last summer and
the flooding that followed.
Rebuilding again in Ruidoso will be hard, if not impossible, said
Riverside RV Park owner Barbara Arthur.
Arthur says her guests scrambled up a nearby slope when the river
started coursing through the site Tuesday afternoon. She also lost her
home in flood.
It was the sixth time the river rose in the last several weeks and by
far the worst, she said. And Tuesday’s rainfall was more than could be
absorbed by the hillsides and canyons within a wildfire burn scar.
Setting records
The floodwaters of the Rio Ruidoso rose more than 20 feet (6 meters) on
Tuesday to set a new record high-water mark, said National Weather
Service meteorologist Todd Shoemake in Albuquerque. That eclipsed the
previously recorded high in July 2024 by nearly 5 feet (1.5 meters).
About 3.5 inches (8.9 centimeters) of rain fell over the South Fork burn
scar in just an hour and a half, Crawford said. As little as a quarter
of an inch (about 6 millimeters) of rain over a burn scar can cause
flooding.
“They were probably already getting some runoff from upstream before it
even actually started raining on top of the wildfire burn scar,”
Shoemake said. “It really was just kind of a terrible coincidence of
events that led to that.”
He likened the intense rainfall to a 100-year storm, which has a 1%
chance of happening in any given year.
[to top of second column]
|
A man crosses the Ruidoso Downs Racetrack which was partially
destroyed after the flood, Wednesday, July 9, 2025, in Ruidoso, N.M.
(AP Photo/Roberto E. Rosales)
Cleanup begins
Emergency crews completed dozens of swift water rescues before the
water receded Tuesday. Two National Guard teams and several local
crews already were in the area when the flooding began, said
Danielle Silva of the New Mexico Department of Homeland Security and
Emergency Management.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham requested a presidential
disaster declaration, tallying more than $50 million in emergency
response expenditures, including water rescues, and damage to public
infrastructure, including toppled bridges and washed out roadways.
The estimate includes flood damage at Ruidoso and beyond from
monsoon rainstorms since late June.
Ruidoso has also recently requested $100 million in federal aid to
convert flood-prone private land to public property after successive
years of violent flooding laid bare the dangers of an expanded
floodplain.
The floods at Ruidoso came just days after flash floods in Texas
killed more than 100 people and left more than 160 people missing.
Bracing for more
Local officials said the village, as the flood hit, was still in the
process of replacing outdoor warning sirens destroyed in last year's
wildfire and reassessing risks along the local flood plain.
Crawford reiterated Wednesday that Ruidoso will continue to be in
the crosshairs with each monsoon, as there's still work to do to
recover from the wildfire. The rainy season begins in June and runs
through September.
The river, meanwhile, is running thick with sediment that can settle
and raise future water levels.
The village’s tourism-based economy also has been thrown into
turmoil again. With floodwaters running through Ruidoso Downs, one
of the horse track's signature races that was scheduled to start
Friday has been derailed.
The mayor said people are anxious as the monsoon is sure to bring
more rain throughout the summer.
“Yesterday was a good lesson — you know, that Mother Nature is a
much bigger, powerful force than we are,” he said Wednesday. “And
that we can do a lot of things to protect ourselves and to try to
help direct and whatever, but we cannot control.”
___
Lee reported from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Bryan from Albuquerque.
Associated Press writers Matt Brown in Denver and Christopher L.
Keller in Albuquerque contributed to this report.
All contents © copyright 2025 Associated Press. All rights reserved |
