DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1545Z July 11, 2009
Oklahoma/N Texas: A large pocket of moderately dense smoke from large prairie fires over NW OK can be seen across south central OK and across the Red River into the northern few lines of counties in Texas. This smoke appears to be pulled aloft within overnight thunderstorms and as the thunderstorms dissipated, the smoke was lifted high and has begun to move back westward as it is now on the south side of the anticyclone centered at OKC. Eastern Canada: Thin to moderately dense smoke from Quebec/Labrador fires over the last few days has tracked SE but is in two pockets or linear areas: One off the SE Labrador coast or north of Newfoundland and the second across the Gulf of St. Lawerence through the Cabot Strait and south of Newfoundland. Newfoundland is not cover except for far N tip, SW tip and coastal areas along the NE portion of the island...though the second pocket is moving NNW at this time. This second pocket covers all of Ile Anticosti, PEI and northern tip of Nova Scotia as well. N Canada: Thin low level smoke from AK fires over the past week has drifted across the SE portion of NWT from Great Slave Lake into far NW Alberta, N Saskatchewan to the latitude of S Reindeer Lake, Nunavut to near the coast of Hudson Bay, and being pulled SSEward by large cyclone over the Bay into N Manitoba (NE of Lake Winnepeg) then across W Ontario to the northern tip of Lake Superior (around the base of the cyclone, then pulled NEward on SW flow to near James bay. Gulf of Alaska/British Columbia: After long debate of where Sarychev Peak-SO2 was still located (using OMI, IASI, Metop SO2 imagery) compared to the smoke and looking a ARL trajectories over the past few days for the smoke, it appears that both have mixed well enough to not be distinguishable from each other...though SO2 signals are still high across the Gulf of AK, so appears to be the smoke from large fires over SW/SW central AK. This area extends south covering a large portion of W BC...until flow slows/shears out under influence from a cut off cyclone W of WA/OR. Interestingly, the most dense area of smoke/SO2 can be seen in this shear axis over N Victoria Island, across S BC and further E into Alberta, where upper level flow becomes stronger and pulls the smoke/SO2 into multiple narrow filaments that have been distinct in Goes-W and Goes-E this morning across S Alberta, SW Saskatchewan, N North Dakota, S Minnesota into the northern Great Lakes where the plumes get mixed with the low level smoke described in N Canada above. Please see links below for exact outlines of these areas. -Gallina More information on the areas of smoke described above as well as others can be found at the locations listed below. THE FORMAT OF THIS TEXT PRODUCT IS BEING MODIFIED. IT WILL NO LONGER DESCRIBE THE VARIOUS PLUMES THAT ARE ASSOCIATED WITH ACTIVE FIRES. THESE PLUMES ARE DEPICTED IN VARIOUS GRAPHIC FORMATS ON OUR WEB SITE: JPEG: http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/FIRE/hms.html GIS: http://www.firedetect.noaa.gov/viewer.htm KML: http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/FIRE/kml.html THIS TEXT PRODUCT WILL CONTINUE TO DESCRIBE SIGNIFICANT AREAS OF SMOKE WHICH HAVE BECOME DETACHED FROM AND DRIFTED SOME DISTANCE AWAY FROM THE SOURCE FIRE, TYPICALLY OVER THE COURSE OF ONE OR MORE DAYS. IT WILL ALSO STILL INCLUDE DESCRIPTIONS OF BLOWING DUST. ANY QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS REGARDING THESE CHANGES OR THE SMOKE TEXT PRODUCT IN GENERAL SHOULD BE SENT TO SSDFireTeam@noaa.gov