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TAOS — A local A man drowned as flash floods ravaged the burnt area left by the state's largest wildfire recorded on Sunday in northern New Mexico, ranchers said.
pickup truck was swept off Highway 434 in a torrent. Kenny Zamora said the man's car was found at his ranch about nine miles northeast of the town of Mora.
"He was pushed into the arroyo because the water was so strong," Zamora said, using the term a usually dry riverbed that flows during heavy rains.
New Mexico State Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The reported incident occurred on July 21 in Las Vegas, New Mexico. It follows three deaths after flash floods occurred in parts of the burn area near the town of .
Zamora said it was his fifth flash flood to hit his ranch.
The extreme heat from wildfires in the so-called Hermit Peak Calf Canyon made the soil unable to absorb water, turning hillsides into life-threatening debris flows during the summer monsoon rains.
Wildfires and subsequent flooding left devastation in his 45-mile stretch of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains northeast of Santa Fe, burning down an area the size of Los Angeles.
More than 430 homes have been destroyed since two federally mandated fires sprang out of control in his April climate-change-induced fires. (Reporting by Andrew Hay, Editing by Toby Chopra)
