Tornado touches down in Roosevelt County

STAFF REPORT

A powerful storm late Friday churned up a short-lived tornado in southern Roosevelt County, dumped as much as 6 inches of hail on Melrose and flooded streets across Clovis.

Officials in Curry and Roosevelt counties reported no serious injuries or major damage.

A National Weather Service meteorologist said a short-lived tornado was confirmed on the ground for about four minutes between Milnesand and Bledsoe, Texas from the storm that swept across much of eastern New Mexico, beginning shortly after 6 p.m. Meteorologist Mark Fettig said the weather service had reports about 6 p.m. of golf-ball-size hail near Pep and hail up to 4 inches deep about 2 miles west of Melrose.

Ellie Mae Smith of Causey, in Melrose on business when the storm hit, reported hail on the ground about 6 inches deep.

Maria Jones at the Melrose Tire Store said lots of travelers and residents headed to the store to take cover.

Jones said “everyone came here for shelter because they didn’t want their car windshield broken ... put their car under the carport.”

Clovis Emergency Manager Dan Heerding said there was flooding and public works crews were working through the night barricading streets. Among the hardest hit areas for flooding, 14th Street near Dennis Chavez Park and Main near Greene Acres Park. Heerding said he had received reports of standing hail on roads all around Melrose.

Retired Clovis City Manager Joe Thomas reported about a half inch of rain in Logan. Fettig said official rainfall numbers from Clovis Municipal Airport were .021 inches of rain during the storm that lasted about an hour and generated a massive double rainbow in the aftermath. Fettig said the southern areas of Clovis were hardest hit with rain and pea-size hail but the weather service hadn’t received any official measurements from their storm watchers.

Weather Service Meteorologist Reymond Jojola said Cannon Air Force Base measure wind speed at 48 mph, but he and Fettig noted Cannon’s weather station often has technical problems during powerful storms. Both said they believed from radar indications the winds were much stronger.