Monday, June 21, 2010

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0300Z June 22, 2010

Canada:
A large area of smoke stretches across most of the southern half of
Canada due to ongoing fires from British Columbia to Quebec. The smoke
is generally moving from west to east from eastern British Columbia
across the prairie provinces and southern Hudson Bay into southern
Quebec and into the north Atlantic. Much of the smoke is light density
but substantial areas of moderately dense to dense smoke were observed
in the vicinity of the larger fires. These areas were seen over central
Quebec and northern and central Saskatchewan.

Southwest US into the Central Plains:
Several fires over Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado have been burning
for numerous days with the smoke plumes moving to the northeast and then
turning more to the east across portions of Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska,
South Dakota and into Iowa and northern Illinois. The massive fire in
Arizona near Flagstaff was generating th most smoke which was dense to
very dense. Moderately dense to locally dense smoke extended in a narrow
ribbon from the Flagstaff fire across Nebraska and into Iowa.

Southern California/Southwest Arizona:
Numerous agricultural fires are producing small amounts of smoke
individually which is merging together in conjunction with a wildfire
in northern Baja. This mass of smoke is drifting to the northeast into
southwest Arizona. The smoke is mainly light.

Ruminski

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.