As residents and businesspeople in Ruidoso assess the damage caused by heavy and dangerous flooding, others can find ways to help. Here is what to know.

The summer rainy season in New Mexico usually brings daily alerts about the potential for flooding around the arid state.

Sandbags protect a building in Ruidoso, New Mexico after floods swept through town in July of 2024. This week's floods rose significantly higher. Photo: The Washington Post

RUIDOSO – Days after the most destructive flood in Ruidoso’s history, New Mexico’s U.S. Sens. Martin Heinrich and Ben Ray Lujan were given a tour of the worst-affected areas, from the Upper Canyon to Ruidoso Downs Racetrack.

The deadly flooding earlier this week forced the Ruidoso Downs racetrack to move its horses to Albuquerque for a second year in a row.

While Ruidoso recovers from flash flooding, one of Albuquerque’s biggest animal adoption groups is stepping in to help Lincoln County’s overwhelmed animal shelter.

Stephanie Hopkins, a Whitehall High School graduate, lost her two young children, 7-year-old Sebastian and 4-year-old Charlotte, during a flash flood in Ruidoso, New Mexico Tuesday.

The two children were identified as Charlotte Trotter, 4, and Sebastian Trotter, 7, according to their aunt Tiffanie Wyatt. She said their father, Sebastian Trotter, a solder based at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, and their mother, Stephanie, both suffered serious injuries but survived and were receiving medical treatment at a hospital in Texas.