Thursday, July 15, 2010

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0300Z July 16, 2010

Currently:

Central Canada/Northern US:
The moderately dense to dense smoke continues to move south across
central Canada with part of it getting wrapped up in the low system.
The southern edge of the smoke continues to move east across the northern
sections of the US.  The wildfires in northern Saskatchewan are producing
very thick smoke and adding to the overall smoke issues.

Pacific Northwest/Idaho/California:
An unidentified aerosol is moving east across Washington, Oregon, Northern
California and Idaho.  It cannot be confirmed if it's smoke from recent
fires in the Pacific Northwest or dust/aerosol from an unknown location.

Washington:
A fire in eastern Chelan county is producing light to moderately dense
smoke moving east into Douglas and Okanogan counties.  Also a fire in
central Lincoln county is emitting mostly moderately dense to dense smoke
east NE into Spokane, Stevens, Pend Oreille counties and northern Idaho.

Colorado:
A fire in Rio Blanco county is emitting light to moderately dense smoke
east into neighboring counties and extending around 150 km from source.

Earlier Today:

Central Canada/Northern US:
Dense smoke from large fires primarily burning in northern Saskatchewan
Province of west central Canada continued to produce huge amounts of
smoke. Dense smoke from these fires initially moved to the west, then
spread both to the south and to the north. Some of the dense smoke moved
south and southeastward over far eastern Montana and the Dakotas while
another area of dense smoke moved northward and eventually eastward over
the area from the Northwest Territories to northern Hudson Bay. Thinner
density smoke covered a larger area surrounding the dense smoke including
a ribbon which moved eastward and then northeastward across Minnesota,
northern Wisconsin, the UP of Michigan, Lake Superior, and eventually
into Ontario Province of central Canada.

South Central and Eastern US:
A large portion of the south central and eastern US was being affected
by patches of aerosol of unknown origin and composition.

Gulf of Mexico:
A batch of aerosol was visible over the western Gulf of Mexico extending
inland over coastal southeastern Texas and southward over the Bay of
Campeche. Some of this aerosol may be dust/sand transported all the
way across the Atlantic from the Sahara in northern Africa. Other
aerosol which is believed to be Saharan dust was detected over the
western Atlantic including the Bahamas and possibly part of the Florida
peninsula though cloudiness there is interfering with detection in
satellite imagery.

Alaska/Northwestern Canada:
Significant cloudiness over Alaska and western Canada has greatly
inhibited fire and smoke detection in satellite imagery.

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.