Flash Flooding After New Mexico Wildfires Highlights Climate Risks

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Dark floodwaters, blackened with soot and ash from the South Fork and Salt fires, rushed down mountain canyons and into town, turning Highway 70 into a river and pushing over a fuel tanker, according to videos posted to social media.

Climate change, driven primarily from the burning of fossil fuels, continues to cause increases in both high-severity fires that kill vegetation and dry out soils, and extreme rainfall events that deliver more precipitation in shorter amounts of time.

The combination of dry soil and heavy rain increases the odds for hazards like flash flooding and debris flows — a dangerous mix of water, mud, boulders and trees after a fire.

Three factors increase the likelihood and danger of a post-fire flooding and debris flow: how severely the soil is burned, how intense the rainfall is and the steepness of the landscape.

“The maps tell us that the risk of both flood and debris flow in these watersheds has increased significantly from before the fires,” said Karen Miranda Gleason, the public information officer for the Burned Area Emergency Response team.

Charred trees border their washed-out driveway, but just across the street, chimneys made of river rock loom above houses flattened by fire.

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