Yesterday, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) quietly announced the cancellation of a mineral withdrawal application for the Upper Pecos River Watershed in northern New Mexico. The Pecos River flows out of the 223,000-acre Pecos Wilderness. The drainage basin covers roughly 44,000 square miles, about 20 percent of New Mexico’s land area.
Almost exactly one year ago, the USFS announced its intention to reverse a recommendation to ban mining and drilling across 163,483 acres of National Forest System land and 1,327 acres of BLM-managed public lands. Starting May 6, the entire area will be open to new hardrock mining claims, as well as oil, gas, and geothermal leasing.
This is not the first time mining has threatened this critical watershed. The Terrero Mine dug for lead, zinc, copper, silver, and gold from 1927 to 1939 until the company walked away, leaving piles of mining waste that spilled into the Pecos River in the early 1990s. While the resulting contamination was severe enough to warrant Superfund designation, local residents, state officials and agencies, and the mining company agreed to share the cleanup costs, with New Mexico taxpayers paying the rest. Nearly a century after the mine closed, the cleanup is still not finished, and the Trump administration just opened the door to do it all over again.
Quick hits
If not RIF, why RIF shaped?
Trump admin to open New Mexico’s Pecos River watershed to mining
Interior budget proposes massive funding and staffing cuts at National Park Service, other agencies
Border wall blasting hits treasured New Mexico mountain
Tribes object as Trump admin fast-tracks opening Chaco to drilling
Native News Online | Outside | Arizona Republic
2025 visits to Colorado National Monument down from previous year
Mapping the dismantling of the U.S. Forest Service
Who is Steve Pearce, Trump’s ‘drill, baby drill’ pick to lead the BLM?
Quote of the day
Chaco Canyon is a living cultural landscape that holds deep historical meaning and is a sacred space for many of our New Mexico Tribes. It is not just one more place to drill. The disrespect shown by the Trump administration toward New Mexicans seems to know no bounds.”
—New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich, ranking member of the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
Picture This
Approaching the near side of the Moon.
The Artemis II astronauts have surpassed the record for the distance from Earth at 1:56 p.m. EDT (1756 UTC). This record was previously set during the Apollo 13 mission when the astronauts traveled 248,655 miles from Earth. The Moon continues to grow larger and larger in the windows of the Orion spacecraft as the Artemis II mission gears up to observe the far side. The astronauts are predicted to make their closest approach of the Moon around 7:02 p.m. EDT (2302 UTC).
Image description: In this view of the Moon, the near side (the hemisphere we see from Earth), is visible at the top half of the Moon disk. It is identifiable by the dark splotches. These are ancient lava flows from a time early in the Moon’s history when it was volcanically active. The large crater that appears below the lava flows, dark in the center, is Orientale basin, a nearly 600-mile-wide crater that straddles the Moon’s near and far sides as is partly visible from Earth on the edge of the Moon. In this image, we have a full view of the crater. Everything below the crater is the far side, the hemisphere we don’t get to see from Earth because the Moon rotates on its axis at the same rate that it orbits round us.
Credit: NASA
Featured image: New Mexico’s Pecos River in winter. Source: Sarah Smith, U.S. Forest Service.