Bluewater, New Mexico
19 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1883 and the latest in 1983. It stands in the Grants census division. It lies in ZIP code area 87005. It lies near Prop Canyon. The Survey maps it on the Bluewater quadrangle. 464 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 6,749 feet above sea level.
On record in Bluewater
Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.
On the National Register 1 record
Bowlin's Old Crater Trading Postlisted 2006
Population over time
2 figuresBluewater fell from 628 to 464 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 628 | |
| 2020 | 464 | -164 (-26%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
10 surveys from 19 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1883 USGS Mt. Taylor quadrangle1:250000
- 1886 USGS Mt. Taylor quadrangle1:250000
- 1892 USGS Mt. Taylor quadrangle1:250000
- 1899 USGS Mt. Taylor quadrangle1:250000, 5 printings
- 1957 USGS Bluewater quadrangle1:24000, 3 printings
- 1958 USGS Albuquerque quadrangle1:250000
- 1962 USGS Albuquerque quadrangle1:250000
- 1963 USGS Albuquerque quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1978 USGS Grants quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
- 1983 USGS Albuquerque quadrangle1:250000
Fires near this place
17 since 1994Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 17 fires within 5 miles of Bluewater between 1994 and 2020, burning about 40 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 2 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Recreation and ceremony | 4 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 4 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 4 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 2 |
| Debris and open burning | 1 |
| Other causes | 1 |
| Natural | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 28 July 2018 | Natural | under an acre | Cibola National Forest | SALITRE |
| 19 July 1994 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Albuquerque District Office | CANYON |
| 13 July 1994 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Cibola National Forest | not named |
| 5 June 2017 | Equipment and vehicle use | 1.5 acres | Bernalillo District | MILE MARKER 74 |
| 29 June 2011 | Equipment and vehicle use | 1.5 acres | Cibola National Forest | MILAN |
| 13 June 2000 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | New Mexico State Forestry Division | FLUME WELL |
| 10 June 2005 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Cibola National Forest | POLE |
| 28 April 2000 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | New Mexico State Forestry Division | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
6 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 6 workings within 5 miles of Bluewater: 3 unknowns, 2 past producers, 1 producer. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Uranium, Stone, Crushed/Broken, Limestone, Dimension. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Materials Pit 67-29-S | Limestone, Dimension | Unknown | ||
| Unnamed Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Unknown | ||
| Unnamed Quarrys | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Unknown | ||
| Bluewater Uranium Mill | Uranium | Producer | ||
| Hope Mine | Uranium | Past Producer | ||
| Section 31 Mine | Uranium | Past Producer |
Storms near this place
6 since 1999Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Bluewater in 6 storm reports between 1999 and 2013: 3 flash flood, 1 thunderstorm wind, 1 hail, 1 funnel cloud. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2008 | Flash Flood | Bluewater | $40,000 | A road was washed out near Bluewater Lake State Park. Two homes were also flooded. |
| August 2008 | Flash Flood | Bluewater | $3,000 | Willis road was washed out, and a home had flooding in its garage and porch. |
| October 2003 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluewater | $2,000 | A tin roof was peeled off a home near Bluewater Lake by gusty winds from a small shower. |
| August 2013 | Funnel Cloud | Bluewater | - | A funnel cloud was reported just north of Bluewater Lake near Mt. Taylor in the vicinity of two merging thunderstorm cells. |
| July 1999 | Flash Flood | Bluewater | - | About a dozen mobile homes were briefly flooded by 1-2 feet of water in the Plano Colorado development west of Bluewater. |
| August 2010 | Hail | Bluewater | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Toltec | 4.9 miles | 20 | |
| Golden Acres | 5.1 miles | 20 | |
| Broadview | 6.3 miles | 20 | |
| Stoneridge | 7.2 miles | 17 | |
| Milan | 7.7 miles | 20 | |
| Diener | 9.3 miles | 17 | |
| Grants | 10.3 miles | 20 | |
| San Rafael | 11.2 miles | 19 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Bluewater | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q4960822 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 923565. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.









