As this year comes to a close, Las Cruces residents and students at NMSU have worked on a way to literally spice up the New Year celebrations in a way that only southern New Mexico can.
While many may associate ringing in the new year with a ball drop, in Las Cruces a chile drop marks the occasion.
For 12 years now, residents and visitors have gathered in the downtown plaza for the drop and enjoy family fun beforehand.
Vice chair of the organization Main Street Las Cruces Jeffery Stewart says that this is a great event for the whole family.
“We have games and the carnival stuff and things that the kids and the family can play with. We have music and we try to keep everyone entertained," Stewart said.
This event has grown over the years and has even attracted the eyes nationwide. In 2023, CNN covered the event and was even named as the #3 best New Years Eve Celebration in the country by USA Today. Stewart says that the event has been growing fast and could see thousands of guests.
“Year over year, it is about a 56% increase so if that holds true then we are looking at about 15,000 people potentially," Stewart said.
But this year will also be the grand revival of a new chile. Working with NMSU Aggie Innovation Space, students have designed a bigger and better chile including 2,400 lights and coming in at over 17 feet in length.
NMSU engineering professor Brooke Montgomery says that this was a great way for their students to get real world experience through working with Main Street Las Cruces and the manufacturing and coding process for the chile.
“They have to take what they were taught in their courses at NMSU and apply it to something so many of the students have theoretically gone through the coding or how to manufacture this at a certain weight with a certain load with certain constraints that were provided but they haven't actually built something at this capacity so it is really an experiential learning project," Montgomery said.
Part of the improvements that were added includes a voting feature where people can vote on whether they want the chile to be red or green when the clock strikes midnight. Montgomery also says that the light show will be more spectacular and that students are excited to see their work become a staple of the event.
“They are excited because it is going to be used at the New Years Eve Chile Drop event so now they will get to see it and it will be used every year for many years to come," Montgomery said.
The chile drop event will start at 6pm and live music will start at 9pm.
