San Juan River Bursts Its Banks, Swamping New Mexico Fields

The swollen San Juan River spilled over its banks and turned fields into a vast brown lake in northwestern New Mexico as days of heavy rain sent rivers across the Four Corners region surging.

X user Victor Lopez filmed the flooding, captioning it “San Juan River flooding.” The video shows muddy water stretching across farmland up to a line of yellowing cottonwood trees, swallowing fences, with a forklift and a truck standing in the water and tires and metal scattered around a flooded yard.

The San Juan County Office of Emergency Management warned that water was rising along the Animas and San Juan rivers and urged people living by the water to “evacuate now,” opening a shelter at McGee Park.

The National Weather Service issued flood warnings for the San Juan River at Farmington and Shiprock. It said the current extent of flooding along the river in New Mexico has not been seen since before Navajo Dam was completed in 1962, with low-lying and agricultural areas downstream through Shiprock at risk. The river at Shiprock was forecast to crest at 17.3 feet early Saturday, above its previous crest of 14.5 feet in 2005.