Tumbleweeds invade Clovis

Clovis, NM - Mother Nature had quite the surprise for many Clovis residents when they woke-up this morning.

It wasn't snow which  temporarily trapped residents inside their homes this morning on the the North side of Clovis. It was something much different.....tumbleweeds.

"Last night it just started raining tumbleweeds we got tumbleweeded quite a bit," said Clovis Resident Robert Biller.

"They were high enough like I said to the roof lines, their garages were covered, their backyards are covered in them, so basically instead of being snowed in you are tumbleweeded in," Justin Howalt who is the City Engineer for the City of Clovis.

The City says a strong wind from the North began around 11 or 12 last night.

Many residents told us they had never seen anything like this before.

However, Biller says he remembers this happening a few times many years ago.

"About 7 1/2 years ago we had this happen, three times in one summer, so we had a nice break from it," Biller explained.

Many people came out to help residents dig out of the overwhelming mess.

"Our crews have been out there since this morning, we started to receive calls, so we sent crews out, all of our available man power is out there and we have assistance from Cannon AFB as well as from private citizens," said Howalt.

Howalt tells us they are gathering up all the tumbleweeds and taking them to the landfill.

The City hopes to have the tumbleweeds cleared by the end of the week.

Until then residents will be digging out and driving cautiously down their street.

"Hopefully we'll get it cleaned up soon," Biller said.