DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0245Z April 04, 2011
East Coast: A few areas of mostly light smoke can be seen off the east coast around Virginia and North Carolina and then southward off the coast of South Carolina. This is most likely remnant smoke from the numerous amount of agricultural burns and subsequent smoke from yesterday that has since moves eastward around the high pressure centered over the southern US. Gulf of Mexico: A large area of light smoke can be seen stretching across Florida from near the Bahamas northwest into the Panhandle of Florida. The fires from the island of the Bahamas the past several days and the remnant smoke from the central plains that has likely rotated around the high pressure is contributing to this. There is also another very large area of light smoke stretching across most of the Gulf of Mexico. Within this, an area of moderate smoke can be see from near southern Louisiana back through portions of southeastern Texas. This smoke continues to be from the numerous fires burning through Mexico and Central America as well as the very large fires that have been burning over northern Mexico recently. Northern Mexico/Southern Texas: As mentioned above, the very large fires that continue to burn across the northern part of Coahuila, Mexico have been producing heavy smoke this afternoon and evening that is moving northeast into portions of southern Texas. Central Plains: Numerous fires were seen again today across this region but due to cloudiness throughout most of the day and heavy convection currently ongoing, not a whole lot of smoke could be seen. Western Texas/Eastern New Mexico: Large fires across this region today produced very large and moderately heavy smoke plumes due to the high winds across that region. In some cases, the smoke plumes can be seen reaching as far as 200 miles away from their point source. Panhandle of Texas/Eastern Colorado/Western Kansas/Southern New Mexico: A few areas of blowing dust could be seen in these region in this evening's satellite imagery. The first could be seen across the Panhandle region of Texas moving eastward/southeastward along the dryline in that region. The second area could be seen moving southward through parts of far eastern Colorado and into western Kansas where high winds have picked up after the passage of the cold front this evening. Lastly, a few small areas of blowing dust could be seen near the border of New Mexico and Mexico moving eastward. Belge 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