DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0100Z MAY 7, 2006.
Western Gulf of Mexico/Texas: A large number of fires continues to burn across Mexico (especially the Yucatan Peninsula) and Central America and produce a very large mass of smoke which covers most of the western half of the Gulf of Mexico. The eastern edge of the smoke is along a line from the eastern tip of the Yucatan peninsula (where the smoke is very dense due to the large number of very intense fires) northwestward to about Port Arthur, Texas. All of south Texas south of about San Antonio and west to around Del Rio is covered in the smoke which is thin to moderately dense. The smoke area continues to slowly drift north. Cuba/Florida/Bahamas: Numerous large fires over western Cuba were responsible for an area of smoke that is moving north from the western third of the island. The smoke is moderately dense to dense within 100 km of Cuba and becomes thinner as is reaches the Florida Keys and southwest Florida as far north as Fort Myers. Several fires over central and south Florida were producing moderately dense to locally dense smoke plumes that were all moving east and off the coast into the Atlantic. The fires were located in northern Highlands, southeast Polk and northern Osceola counties. Another fire over northwest Broward had a smoke plume extending to the east northeast into southern Palm beach county. A large fire on northern Andros Island in the Bahamas has been burning for a few days and has a lengthy smoke plume associated with it that extends to the northeast into the open Atlantic. Pennsylvania: A narrow plume of moderately dense smoke from a fire in southern Clinton county, in or near the Sproul State Forest, extended about 50 km to the southeast. Northern Plains: A large number of fires were seen over northwest Minnesota, North Dakota and into south central Canada. A few small smoke plumes were seen over northwest Minnesota and along the North and South Dakota border. Arizona: A fire over northwest Coconino county, very close to the Grand Canyon, was producing a moderately dense to locally dense smoke plume that was spreading east about 200 km and had reached northern Apache county. Southern California: A pair of fires were seen over southwest San Bernardino county. The larger smoke producing fire was in the vicinity of Mount Baldy and the moderately dense smoke was swirling around within about 50 km of the fire. Another fire was in or near the San Gorgonio wilderness and had a narrow, thin smoke plume that extended less than 50 km to the northeast. Mexico: A large fire near or in the Sierra Del Carmen range in northern Mexico was emitting a moderately dense smoke plume that was drifting to the northeast. At sunset the plume had not reached the Rio Grande. A large number of fires were over northwest Durango and southern Chihuahua states. Clouds have moved over the region by afternoon and have precluded the detection of smoke. However, based on the past several days, it is likely that smoke covers much of the region. Ruminski