DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0330Z October 21, 2010
Southeast US/Gulf of Mexico: A large area of thin smoke was positioned along a frontal boundary that was slowly moving off the southeast US coast this evening. This smoke stretched from eastern South Carolina across Georgia and north Florida before turning westward across the northern Gulf of Mexico to just south of Louisiana. The bulk of this smoke is likely from the numerous agricultural fires that have been burning along the Mississippi River for the past few days, along with remnant smoke from a wildfire burning in Louisiana. California: A lengthy area of thin to moderate density smoke could be seen as evening approached within the central valley in California. Numerous agricultural fires in the valley along with other fires in the state and in Oregon are likely responsible for this mass of smoke, which may be from today or yesterday's fires. Pacific Northwest: Remnant smoke could be seen drifting northeastward across eastern Washington state into extreme northern Idaho. With numerous fires burning today and yesterday in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho this smoke likely originated from a combination of fires in these states. Sheffler 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