‹ Back

Toggle Daily

Hurricane Polo makes landfall as flash floods threaten the US Southwest

September 29, 2026

Hurricane Polo made landfall in Mexico's Baja California on Tuesday with flash flooding and dangerous winds, and forecasters expect heavy rain across the US Southwest.

Polo intensified over the Eastern Pacific during an above-average hurricane season there, with its winds climbing from 45 mph to 150 mph.

Key facts

ABC News reports that Hurricane Polo came ashore early Tuesday in Mexico's Baja California, bringing flash flooding and winds that forecasters called “life-threatening.” CBS News carries the same landfall and follows the storm further. Its account has the core crossing the Gulf of California to strike Sonora a second time, then weakening as it tracks into the southwestern United States and nears El Paso on Wednesday morning with winds near 35 miles per hour. The Washington Post, in its headline, ties the coming flash flood danger in the Southwest to what is left of Polo.

The outlets agree that the larger threat now lies north of the border. CBS News reports that flash floods could put more than 30 million people at risk across an area from Arizona to Iowa, and that more than 14 million Americans are at risk of major flooding, and it cites the National Weather Service Prediction Center warning of a "significant flash flood threat across the Four Corners Region eastward into the Central Plains." ABC News names Arizona, Utah, New Mexico and Texas as places in line for inches of rain and quotes Andrew Mangham, a National Weather Service hydrologist in Albuquerque, on how bare canyons and rocky ground feed flash floods. CBS News also reports roads already under water in southern New Mexico, where drivers were stuck in their cars until the flooding eased.

CBS News ranks Polo among the strongest Eastern Pacific hurricanes, with central pressure second only to 2015's Hurricane Patricia and weekend winds of 180 mph that tie 2009's Hurricane Rick for third. The landfall in Baja California is corroborated. The rain totals, the second landfall in Sonora and the path toward El Paso are forecasts and are still developing.

Still developing

The flash flood threat across the southwestern United States is still a forecast, stretching from Arizona to Iowa. The second landfall in Sonora, Mexico, is also still expected.

How settled the reporting is

Reported 10% · Contested 0% · Developing 90%

Sources

Toggle read the full reports of 3 of the 4 outlets counted on this event. The other 1 are counted from their headlines and opening sentences.