Saturday, April 9, 2011

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0330Z April 10, 2011

Northern Mexico/West Texas/New Mexico/Oklahoma/Kansas:
Significant blowing dust event throughout the day today. Dust was seen
originating from numerous point sources across the state of Chihuahua,
Mexico and moving toward the northeast. By sunset, areas of dense blowing
dust were seen as far north as extreme southeast Colorado. The dust spread
across central and eastern New Mexico and into western Texas before mixing
in with areas of dense smoke. Several brush fires broke out across eastern
NM and western TX this afternoon/evening and were producing dense smoke,
which was tracking to the northeast. This made distinguishing between
dust/smoke difficult as it moved away from its source point. However,
mostly smoke moved toward OK and into KS by sunset where it merged with
lighter remnant smoke of the past few days. In addition to what was
discussed earlier today (see below) there was an area of light smoke
analyzed in south central Texas and northern Mexico. These areas were
moving north and are likely remnant from the days fires burning in south
central Mexico.

Tennessee/Northern Alabama/Northern Georgia:
An earlier area of light to moderately dense smoke over the central US
was now seen drifting through Tennessee and into portions of northern
Alabama and northern Georgia. This is still remnant from fires in KS,
OK, TX and northern Mexico.

Smoke analyzed this morning continued to persist this evening in the
Gulf of Mexico and off the southeast coast of the US. See below for the
narrative from earlier today:

Gulf of Mexico:
Thin to moderate density remnant smoke covered most of the Gulf of Mexico
this morning. Much of this smoke was drifting northward from Mexico
although some was also originating from Cuba. In addition, remnant smoke
from fires in the southeast had expanded southward across Florida and
was sinking southward in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

Southeast US:
Remnant smoke from fires in the southeast US and possibly also from those
in the central US over the past few days was spilling off the Georgia
and South Carolina coasts across the Atlantic. Some of this smoke was
moderate in density.

Central US:
A fairly large area of smoke was present over the central US this
morning, stretching from Illinois/Iowa southwest to Oklahoma/north
Texas. This smoke likely is a combination from several areas of fires,
from those is Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and especially those in northern
Mexico. Moderately dense to dense remnant smoke was seen over north Texas,
Oklahoma, and drifting into Arkansas.

Northern Mexico/West Texas/New Mexico:
Strong winds of 30-40 kts over north central Mexico, New Mexico, and
west Texas causing several point sources of dust/sand to be picked up
and blown to the northeast. Two or three plumes of blowing dust could
be seen southwest of El Paso, Texas with surface ob reports of haze or
blowing dust at Pecos, TX and Albuquerque, NM.

Earle/Sheffler

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.