Friday, June 4, 2010

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0300Z June 5, 2010

Currently:
Alaska/Canada:
The long area of smoke continues to spread eastward across Quebec into
New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador. An area
of moderately dense to dense smoke stretches from eastern Northwest
Territories across northern Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and into
central Quebec.  The western region of the smoke has pushed westward
into the Bering Strait.

Southern California:
An area of unknown aerosols is slowly moving eastward across the counties
of Orange, Los Angeles and western sections of San Bernardino/Riverside
counties.  The area could be residual smoke.

Gulf of Mexico:
An area of moderately dense smoke has spread into sections of the
west central Gulf of Mexico with light smoke spreading from along the
southeastern coast of Texas east into southwestern Florida and as far
north as the Louisiana coast. Smoke has wrapped around the low situated
in Louisiana with light smoke on the west side of it across eastern Texas.

New Mexico/Western Texas:
Wildfires burning in Sierra and Socorro counties are producing mostly
moderately dense to dense smoke.  The smoke from the wildfire in
Socorro county is moving east into Torrance, Lincoln and Otero counties.
The smoke from the wildfire in Sierra county is moving south into Luna,
Dona Ana and Grant counties.  The heaviest smoke is staying mostly within
the county borders of Sierra, Socorro and Grant.

Earlier Today:
Alaska/Canada:
A tremendously long area of thin smoke with more dense embedded patches,
resulting from a number of significant fires scattered primarily across
northwestern Canada and Alaska, was observed this morning extending from
at least the eastern half of Alaska and the Arctic Ocean eastward across
the Yukon, the Northwest Territories, and the western and central portion
of the Nunavut Territory of Canada. The smoke then continued eastward and
southeastward across much of central Canada to southeastern Canada where
it then curved eastward across Newfoundland and out over the Labrador
Sea and the northwestern Atlantic.

New Mexico/Western Texas:
A batch of thin density smoke was visible this morning moving to the
southeast from several fires detected over western New Mexico. The smoke
covered southern New Mexico and the far western portion of Texas.

Southern Plains/Middle Mississippi Valley/Southeast/Middle Atlantic
Region:
A large mass of aerosol was visible this morning across much of the
Southern Plains extending eastward over much of the Southeast and the
Middle Atlantic Region around North Carolina and the Delmarva. It is
possible that some remnant smoke from the New Mexico fires as well as
from the ongoing seasonal fires burning in Mexico and Central America
may be present in this region, though the actual contribution of smoke
to the aerosol seen in satellite imagery is uncertain.

Gulf of Mexico:
Smoke from the ongoing seasonal fires burning in Mexico and Central
America was present over the Bay of Campeche and a good portion of the
central and southern parts of the Gulf of Mexico. The thin density smoke
also appeared to be very close to or over the south central portion of
the Florida peninsula.

J Kibler


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.osdpd.noaa.gov/ml/land/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


 


Unless otherwise indicated:
  • Areas of smoke are analyzed using GOES-EAST and GOES-WEST Visible satellite imagery.
  • Only a general description of areas of smoke or significant smoke plumes will be analyzed.
  • A quantitative assessment of the density/amount of particulate or the vertical distribution is not included.
  • Widespread cloudiness may prevent the detection of smoke even from significant fires.