Friday, April 8, 2011

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0230Z April 09, 2011

Eastern Gulf of Mexico:
Patches of thin density remnant smoke likely from fires over Florida
and/or Cuba during the past day was visible moving to the north-northwest
just off the western coast of Florida.

Western Gulf of Mexico/Texas/Louisiana:
Aerosol which is likely composed of smoke from seasonal fires burning
over Mexico and Central America was seen moving to the north across the
western Gulf of Mexico into southeastern Texas and southern Louisiana. The
smoke then spread northward over eastern Texas and northern Louisiana
to at least as far north as southeastern Oklahoma and southern Arkansas.

Northern Mexico/Texas:
Fires over western and northwestern Mexico were emitting plumes of smoke
during the day which moved mainly to the northeast. Some of the thin
density leading edge of this smoke had blown all the way into extreme
southwestern Texas just prior to sunset. Farther to the northeast, huge
fires continued to burn in northern Mexico just south of the Texas border
producing dense smoke which moved rapidly to the northeast crossing the
border just north of Del Rio and continuing to the northeast reaching
northeastern Texas just east of Dallas-Ft. Worth by late in the day.

South Central US:
In addition to all of the smoke from the various other sources described
above, more dense smoke was observed moving to the northeast from a large
fire in northwest Texas in King and Stonewall Counties. Thinner density
smoke from this fire during the past 24 hours spread all the way to
the northeast and east across portions of Oklahoma, Arkansas, southern
Missouri, western Tennessee, and northern Mississippi and Alabama. A
very large number of what are believed to be primarily seasonal fires
over northern Oklahoma and central to eastern Kansas resulted in a
large patch of thin to moderately dense smoke which moved to the north
and northwest across Kansas. Cloudiness did interfere with additional
details concerning this area of smoke.

New Mexico:
Streaks of blowing dust could be seen late in the day extending from
sources in southwestern New Mexico as well as the White Sands region of
south central New Mexico. The thin density blowing dust stretched all
the way to northeastern New Mexico by sunset.

JS


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.