DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THRU 0230Z August 16, 2005
Alaska/Canada/northern U.S.: The widespread very large fires burning across Alaska are producing a dense canopy of smoke covering a good portion of Alaska. The smoke has also spread even farther westward than earlier today and extends well across the Bering Sea and Bering Strait into eastern Russia. Smoke from these fires has also been transported by mid/upper level winds southeastward across British Columbia and over the southern tier of Canada all the way into Quebec Province. Some of this smoke area also has pushed into the northern U.S. stretching from Montana across the northern Plains to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Additionally, scattered fires over northeastern Oregon, southeastern Washington, north central Idaho, and western Montana were responsible for significant smoke plumes which were moving northeastward and eventually merging with the Alaskan smoke area over Montana. Finally, a thin ribbon of detatched smoke, likely originating from the fires over Oregon/Washington/Idaho/Montana, was visible this evening from southern Montana/northern Wyoming to the central Plains. JS