DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0245 UTC August 3, 2007
Eastern US: Smoke from western US fires has been trapped by weak upper level flow across eastern US and is becoming very difficult to distinguish between pollution/haze. The most dense areas (usually of moderate density) can be broken up into different pockets: New England, Midwest, and Midatlantic regions. New England: A moderate area of smoke and haze is shaped as an upsidedown V or U at the top of an eastward tilting upper level ridge with the pinnicle over Caribou, ME... a 100km wide strip extends southward along the ME coast to Boston across Martha's Vineyard and SE out to sea near 39N68W. The eastern arm extends along the St. Lawerence River Valley and thins out a bit over Eastern Lake Ontario... but connects up to the Midwest section. Midwest: The moderate area extends from Western NY across OH, IN, KY, N AR, E OK, S MO, NE TN. The area of smoke and haze is particularly dense from Louisville to Pittsburgh. Midatlantic: A pocket of moderately dense smoke and haze can be seen across the Delmarva peninsula and ESEward out to sea near 37N71W. There is also some weak extention of the area across S MD, C VA to Northcentral NC. Great Lakes, Upper Midwest, Northern Great Plains: Due to a strong upper low and associated cold front, smoke from Tuesday and Wednesday's burning in ID, MT has become very dense due to the convergence along the front extending from around a strong thunderstorm complex near North Bay, Ontario across Manitoulin Island (St. George's Bay/Lake Huron), N LP of MI, Racine/Kenosha, WI, to the Quad Citys of IA, where the flow becomes less affected by the cyclone and flow begins to let the smoke area widen across all of IA, NE, SD and the SW half of ND. UP of Michigan: A new large fire N of Newberry, MI in central Luce coutny is producing a fan of moderate to dense smoke due the passing front. Upper level winds from the WSW have rapidly pulled smoke over 270km away to near Capreol, ON. The low level smoke which is more dense and narrower extends 80km SE to around Allenville in Mackinac county nearing I-75. An area of thin smoke covers the area between the two end points described above. MN/SW Ontario: A new fire near Gold Rock, E of the Eastern tip of the Lake of the Woods in SW Ontario is producing a narrow plume of moderate to dense smoke that is rapidly moving ESE due to strong winds S of the strong cyclone. The smoke extends more than 300km almost to Thunder Bay, ON. South and West of the Lake of the Woods around the Lost River State Forest in N MN multiple fires produced smoke that is also moving ESE along the MN/ON border almost as far as Lake Superior. Since the fires were not consistent, typically producing bursts of moderate smoke...the plume is broken and thinner in appearance to the Gold Rock fire's smoke. Northern US Rockies/S Canadaian Rockies: Multiple very large fire complexes across ID/W MT continue to produce very dense smoke, however, the area has become covered with upper level clouds and thunderstorms. Still at the periphery of the clouds areas of moderate to dense smoke can be seen covering all of MT, Alberta south of 53N, and portions of SK between 51N-54N and 107W to 110W. Some convectively dense smoke plumes can be seen through the broken wx clouds over N MT...including the Brush Creek, Garceau, Fool Creek and Skyland Complexes all of which extend ENE with a plume about 20-35km wide ranging from 50-150km in length. In Canada the fire complexes are not obscurred by the wx clouds and convectively dense smoke from fires along the Selkirk and Purcell Ranges of SE BC and have combined into a large plume that extend NE 181km from the fire along Slocan Lake to around Calgary and is about 50km wide. Nevada: A large break in the clouds across northern and central NV exposes a large area of moderate to dense smoke area (most likely from fires across Sawtooth Mtns in S ID). The smoke covers all of Elko, Lander, Eureka and extreme N Nye coutny. California: The Zaca fire has two smoke areas. An area of moderate smoke along the Santa Barbara/San Luis Obispo county line from Bitter Creek NWR to around the Los Padres NF boundary (east to west). The second area is moving at the south into the Santa Barbara channel from a point near or just E of Lake Cachuma. It has been moderate in density but a recent convective burst occurred, overshooting the plume. A new fire over NW San Diego county (most likely on Camp Pendelton Base) produced a puff of moderately dense smoke that drifted west twoard Temecula and Murrieta. The Elk Complex is producing dense smoke that is moving due west but covering all of Siskiyou to the Modoc county line. A bit of moderately dense smoke is tricking southward into NE Trinity and all of Shasta county. Oregon: The WSA Lightning Complex has produced a large area of thin to moderate smoke from last night's burning that covers nearly all of north central OR including Sherman, Wasco, Jefferson, Deschutes and eastern portions of Crook county. Washington: Two new wildfires along the Kittitas county line south of I-90. The first near Snowshoe Butte is produced an inital burst of smoke reached very high in the atmosphere and began to move NE and currenty is over 160km NE of the fire near Monse (US-97 in Okanogan county. Since then the smoke has become lower in level so it fans out covering Kittitas county with a low level concentrated (10km wide) plume extending due east along I-95 then turning south along I-82 to the county line. The second fire is tucked into SW Kittitas county but has only produced moderately dense low level plume of smoke that has remained in the upper reaches of the Naches River valley. SE NW Territories/N Saskatechwan: A very large complex NE of Fond du Lac (N of the eastern arm of Lake Athabasca) is producing very dense smoke that is drifting slowly SE over the eastern portion of the Lake (131km) and since the complex is very wide, the plume is over 60km wide E-W. Multiple smaller fires across SE NW Territories are each producing thin to moderately dense smoke that was moving SE but has recently begun to swing around to the east. Each extend about 50km and are about 10-15km wide. A fire near 57N104W is producing thin smoke that extends 67km SE and is about 12 km wide. Gallina