DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0245Z June 20, 2010
Central Canada/North Dakota: A very large area of smoke was seen this evening covering most of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba as well as southeast Northwest Territories, southern Nunavut and extending into central Hudson Bay and central Quebec. Light to moderate density smoke had also dropped into portions of Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota. Widespread cloud cover over much of the area this evening made it somewhat difficult to determine the exact extent and density of the smoke. Areas of very dense smoke were embedded within the larger smoke plume over northern Saskatchewan and northeast Alberta near the numerous wildfires. Northeast US/Southeast Canada: Remnant smoke, mainly from an extremely large wildfire in south central Quebec, extended eastward from the fire into the mouth of the St Lawrence and then curved to the south, blanketing New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and clipping the east and south portions of Maine. Smoke was moderately dense to dense south of Nova Scotia. Widespread cloud cover hindered smoke analysis closer to the wildfire over south central Quebec. Central Plains: An area of what is believed to be thin remnant smoke from wildfires over Colorado and northern Arizona was seen over northeast Kansas, southeast Nebraska, southwest Iowa and northwest Missouri. A large complex of thunderstorms prevented a more detailed analysis of this area of presumed smoke. Please see the graphics at the web addresses below for additional smoke still attached to active fires in New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado. Hanna 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