Severe flooding in the Four Corners region of the Southwest has forced rooftop rescues and evacuations, and more high water is expected through the weekend.1,2,3,4
Flooding along the San Juan and Animas rivers slammed communities across San Juan County on Thursday. The disaster was triggered by a Pacific storm system that moved inland across Southern California, dropping heavy rain and sending millions of gallons of runoff surging into the two rivers. The storm has also battered Colorado, Utah and Arizona.4
New Mexico State Police and National Guard troops pulled stranded residents to safety and searched the river in Bloomfield. Floodwaters swallowed cars, poured into homes and forced families onto rooftops. According to KOAT, at least 60 rescues have been carried out between Farmington and Bloomfield since Thursday afternoon. The New Mexico National Guard also rescued an infant suffering seizures on Thursday night.4
Aimee Goodday, a mother whose family was caught in the flooding, described the scene to KOAT. "We lost everything, everything… We were all freaked out and stuff, but one of us had to be the adult," she said. Her family moved onto the roof of their trailer as freezing floodwater rose inside, and they remained there for 12 hours before rescuers reached them.4
Farmington Police Chief Steve Hebbe addressed the scale of the flooding at a press conference. "This is a once-in-a-generation time. This is singular and this is real. So far, we have not had any deaths but this is not anything that should be played with," Hebbe said.4
The flooding forced around 600 households in Farmington to evacuate. Emergency shelters were opened at McGee Park to house displaced families.4
Flooding in other parts of the region has also caused damage. In Utah, the city of Hurricane declared an emergency on Thursday after what it described as "approximately 80 residential homes and 50 recreational vehicles" were impacted. In southern Colorado, floodwaters rose as high as four to five feet inside some homes, leaving residents scrambling to escape.4
The reports do not give a total count of people displaced across the region, nor a full assessment of property damage. Hebbe's statement that there had been no deaths so far was made at a press conference, and the reports do not indicate whether that remains the case.4
More water is expected to surge downstream along the San Juan and Animas rivers through the weekend.4
