NEW MEXICO

Hundreds rescued after 2 die in flooding

ALBUQUERQUE — A southeastern New Mexico community began to dry out on Oct. 21 after historic rainfall over the weekend produced severe flooding that left at least two people dead and hundreds stranded on rooftops.

Waterlogged vehicles were still submerged along some city streets in Roswell, while others were seen smashed along bridge supports and tossed up against trees and power poles after being swept away by the floodwaters on Oct. 19 and 20.

All the standing water and mangled masses of twisted guardrails and splintered wood were scenes unfamiliar for the community. Surrounded by usually dusty plains and dairy farms, Roswell isn’t famous for any notable rainfall but rather for being the spot where a spacecraft purportedly crashed in 1947.

Less than a foot of rain usually falls in Roswell an average year, but forecasters with the National Weather Service in Albuquerque said that the weekend deluge was spurred by an upper-level low pressure system that was parked over Arizona.

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More than 300 people were rescued by the New Mexico National Guard. New Mexico State Police said two people died as a result of the flash flood.

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared an emergency in response to the flooding, clearing the way for $1 million in state funding to bolster relief efforts.

Forecasters said 5.78 inches of rain fell on Roswell on Oct. 19, breaking the city’s previous daily record of 5.65 inches set on Nov. 1, 1901. Some areas surrounding Roswell received around 9 inches of rain in a matter of hours, according to the National Weather Service.

Order banning guns in playgrounds rescinded

SANTA FE — Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham announced on Oct. 16 that she has ended an emergency public health order that suspended the right to carry guns at public parks and playgrounds in Albuquerque, New Mexico’s largest metro area.

The original public health order in September 2023 ignited a furor of public protests, prompted Republican calls for the governor’s impeachment and widened divisions among top Democratic officials. It also sought to strengthen oversight of firearms sales and monitor illicit drug use at public schools through the testing of wastewater.

Lujan Grisham described strides toward reducing gun violence through gun buy-back programs, increased arrests, the distribution of free gun-storage locks and a larger inmate population at a county detention facility in Albuquerque.

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The governor’s initial order would have suspended gun-carry rights in most public places in the Albuquerque area, but was scaled back to public parks and playgrounds with an exception to ensure access to a municipal shooting range park. Lujan Grisham said she was responding to a series of shootings around the state that left children dead.

Gun rights advocates filed an array of lawsuits and court motions aimed at blocking gun restrictions that they say would deprive Albuquerque-area residents of 2nd Amendment rights to carry in public for self-defense. The implications for pending lawsuits in federal court were unclear.

OKLAHOMA

Official sued to block schools’ Bible mandate

OKLAHOMA CITY — A group of Oklahoma parents of public school students, teachers and ministers filed a lawsuit on Oct. 17 seeking to stop the state’s top education official from forcing schools to incorporate the Bible into lesson plans for students in grades 5 through 12.

The lawsuit filed with the Oklahoma Supreme Court also asks the court to stop Republican State Superintendent Ryan Walters from spending $3 million to purchase Bibles in support of his mandate.

The suit alleges that the mandate violates the Oklahoma Constitution because it involves spending public money to support religion and favors one religion over another by requiring the use of a Protestant version of the Bible.

The plaintiffs are represented by several civil rights groups, including the Oklahoma chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law & Justice.

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The suit also notes that the initial “request for proposal” released by the State Department of Education to purchase the Bibles appears to have been carefully tailored to match Bibles endorsed by former President Donald Trump that sell for $59.99 each. The RFP was later amended at the request of state purchasing officials.

Walters said in a statement posted to his account on X that he will “never back down to the woke mob.”

Walters, a former public school teacher elected in 2022, ran on a platform of fighting “woke ideology,” banning books from school libraries and getting rid of “radical leftists” who he claims are indoctrinating children in classrooms.

ARIZONA

Rare condors get to live in wild

By all accounts, Milagra the “miracle” California condor shouldn’t be alive today.

But at nearly 17 months old, she was one of three of the giant endangered birds who got to stretch their wings in the wild as part of a late September release near the Grand Canyon.

After sitting in the pen for an hour and 20 minutes, Milagra exited the enclosure and took flight. When a livestream of the wildlife release ended, a fourth condor remained in the pen, not ready to leave. Milagra managed to survive against all odds. Her mother died from the worst outbreak of avian flu in U.S. history soon after she laid her egg, and her father nearly succumbed to the same fate while struggling to incubate the egg alone.

Milagra, which means miracle in Spanish, was rescued from her nest and hatched in captivity thanks to the care of her foster condor parents.

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The emergency operation was part of a program established about 40 years ago to help bring the birds back from the brink of extinction when their numbers had plummeted to fewer than two dozen.

The Peregrine Fund and the Bureau of Land Management streamed the release of Milagra and the others online on Sept. 28 from Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, about 50 miles from the Grand Canyon’s North Rim.

Condors have been released there since 1996. But the annual practice was put on hold last year due to what is known as the “bird flu.” Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza killed 21 condors in the Utah-Arizona flock.

Today, as many as 360 of the birds are estimated to be living in the wild, with some in the Baja of Mexico and most in California, where similar releases continue. More than 200 others live in captivity.

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