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After its hottest August on record, Albuquerque got its wettest September

The Rio Grande ran dry through the city for all of August. Then 4.49 inches of rain fell at the Sunport, nearly all of it in the last two and a half weeks of September.

By Duke City Ledger
2 min read ALBUQUERQUE
What the public records and data show, with the sources listed at the end. How we label stories Found and written by our AI desk, then read and checked by the editor before it went up. How we label stories
Storm clouds lit gold by the low sun over Albuquerque, with a curtain of rain falling on the city at left
A storm over Albuquerque in October 2016. Photo: Brandon Stephenson (cropped) · CC0

The short version

  • August 2026 was Albuquerque's hottest August since records began in 1891, averaging 82.5 degrees at the Sunport.
  • September brought 4.49 inches of rain, the wettest September on record and nearly four times normal.
  • The Rio Grande gauge in Albuquerque read zero flow every day of August; by the end of September it was running again, but the county is still in severe drought.

Albuquerque set two weather records in two months, and they pulled in opposite directions. August was the hottest August on record in Albuquerque, averaging 82.5 degrees at the Sunport. September was the wettest September on record, with 4.49 inches of rain, nearly four times normal.

A dry river under a hot sky

Through Aug. 28 the Sunport recorded 0.12 inch of rain, about a tenth of a normal August. The U.S. Geological Survey gauge on the Rio Grande in Albuquerque recorded no flow at all on every day from July 26 through Sept. 3. By Aug. 30, 112.4 miles of the river between Cochiti and Elephant Butte were dry, the most since at least 2007.

Then two weeks of rain

Through Sept. 13, the Sunport had two hundredths of an inch. Then a run of storms, fed late in the month by the remnants of Hurricane Polo, dropped 4.47 inches in 17 days.

The month’s 4.49 inches, almost all of it from that 17-day run, broke Albuquerque’s September record of 3.97 inches, set in 2013.

Rain at the Sunport since Aug. 1, piling up day by day
0246Aug 1Sep 30This year, Aug 1: 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.00This year, : 0.06This year, Aug 15: 0.06This year, : 0.06This year, : 0.11This year, : 0.11This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.12This year, : 0.29This year, : 0.29This year, : 0.67This year, Sep 1: 0.68This year, : 0.68This year, : 0.68This year, : 0.68This year, : 0.68This year, : 0.68This year, : 0.68This year, : 0.69This year, : 0.69This year, : 0.69This year, : 0.69This year, : 0.69This year, : 0.69This year, : 1.10This year, Sep 15: 1.10This year, : 1.27This year, : 1.68This year, : 2.66This year, : 2.67This year, : 2.67This year, : 2.67This year, : 3.14This year, : 3.87This year, : 3.91This year, : 3.98This year, : 3.98This year, : 3.98This year, : 4.19This year, : 5.16This year, Sep 30: 5.160.005.16Normal, Aug 1: 0.06Normal, : 0.11Normal, : 0.17Normal, : 0.22Normal, : 0.27Normal, : 0.33Normal, : 0.38Normal, : 0.42Normal, : 0.47Normal, : 0.52Normal, : 0.56Normal, : 0.61Normal, : 0.65Normal, : 0.70Normal, Aug 15: 0.74Normal, : 0.78Normal, : 0.82Normal, : 0.86Normal, : 0.89Normal, : 0.92Normal, : 0.96Normal, : 0.99Normal, : 1.02Normal, : 1.06Normal, : 1.09Normal, : 1.13Normal, : 1.17Normal, : 1.20Normal, : 1.24Normal, : 1.27Normal, : 1.31Normal, Sep 1: 1.35Normal, : 1.39Normal, : 1.43Normal, : 1.46Normal, : 1.50Normal, : 1.54Normal, : 1.58Normal, : 1.62Normal, : 1.66Normal, : 1.70Normal, : 1.74Normal, : 1.78Normal, : 1.81Normal, : 1.85Normal, Sep 15: 1.89Normal, : 1.93Normal, : 1.97Normal, : 2.00Normal, : 2.04Normal, : 2.08Normal, : 2.12Normal, : 2.16Normal, : 2.20Normal, : 2.24Normal, : 2.28Normal, : 2.32Normal, : 2.35Normal, : 2.39Normal, : 2.43Normal, Sep 30: 2.462.46
  • This year
  • Normal

Running total of daily precipitation at the Albuquerque Sunport, Aug. 1 to Sept. 30, 2026, against the 1991-2020 daily normals. A trace counts as zero. Source: NOAA Regional Climate Centers' ACIS, Albuquerque area record, pulled Oct. 5, 2026.

Show the numbers
DayThis yearNormal
Aug 10.000.06
0.000.11
0.000.17
0.000.22
0.000.27
0.000.33
0.000.38
0.000.42
0.000.47
0.000.52
0.000.56
0.000.61
0.000.65
0.060.70
Aug 150.060.74
0.060.78
0.110.82
0.110.86
0.120.89
0.120.92
0.120.96
0.120.99
0.121.02
0.121.06
0.121.09
0.121.13
0.121.17
0.121.20
0.291.24
0.291.27
0.671.31
Sep 10.681.35
0.681.39
0.681.43
0.681.46
0.681.50
0.681.54
0.681.58
0.691.62
0.691.66
0.691.70
0.691.74
0.691.78
0.691.81
1.101.85
Sep 151.101.89
1.271.93
1.681.97
2.662.00
2.672.04
2.672.08
2.672.12
3.142.16
3.872.20
3.912.24
3.982.28
3.982.32
3.982.35
4.192.39
5.162.43
Sep 305.162.46

The river is back. The drought is not over.

By Sept. 29 the gauge was running at 1,510 cubic feet a second, a provisional reading. The Sept. 29 drought monitor moved Bernalillo County from extreme to severe drought, one level better.

Before the rain came, Brian Guyer, a meteorologist with the weather service, wrote in a statement to the Daily Lobo that recovering would take “more than just one above normal winter season as impacts to area rivers, groundwater supply, and reservoir levels have been severe.”

Updated Oct. 14, 2026: We revised this story to source its facts to public records where we could, and removed details and quotes we could not confirm from a record.

Read next Government

The Rio Grande was dry at Albuquerque 83 days this year, the most on record

A new Ledger page follows the gauge on the Rio Grande at Albuquerque as it reads, along with the weather, the air, the city's police calls and its 311 line. Here is what it shows, and where every figure comes from. 8 min read

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Where this came from

This story draws on the reporting and public records listed here. Where they differ from this page, go by the original.

  1. NOWData, Albuquerque Area monthly records National Weather Service, Albuquerque
  2. Monthly climate report, Albuquerque (September 2026 figures; the page shows the latest month) National Weather Service, Albuquerque
  3. Albuquerque experiences hottest August and summer on record Daily Lobo
  4. Albuquerque sees wettest September on record Daily Lobo
  5. Polo's remnants brought record rain, flooding to Plains, Southwest The Weather Channel
  6. Rio Grande in Albuquerque reaches historic dryness level Source NM
  7. Rio Grande at Albuquerque, NM, monitoring location 08330000 U.S. Geological Survey
  8. U.S. Drought Monitor data tables, Bernalillo County National Drought Mitigation Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Cite this story
APA

Duke City Ledger. (2026, October 6). After its hottest August on record, Albuquerque got its wettest September. Duke City Ledger. https://dukecityledger.com/news/hottest-august-wettest-september/

MLA

“After its hottest August on record, Albuquerque got its wettest September.” Duke City Ledger, 6 Oct. 2026, https://dukecityledger.com/news/hottest-august-wettest-september/.

Chicago

Duke City Ledger. “After its hottest August on record, Albuquerque got its wettest September.” Duke City Ledger, October 6, 2026. https://dukecityledger.com/news/hottest-august-wettest-september/.

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#weather#drought#rio grande#water

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