DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1715Z May 1, 2011
Gulf of Mexico: Another area of large and mostly light remnant smoke continues to make its way across the Gulf of Mexico per satellite imagery this morning. Remnant smoke from the many agricultural burns in Central America as well as the numerous wildfires through Texas and northern Mexico over the past several days and weeks has led to this large area moving eastward. Off the East Coast: An elongated area of light smoke can be seen off the east coast this morning from the Mid-Atlantic southward to near Florida. Again, this is most likely due to the large amount of remnant smoke over the past several days over the Gulf that has moved east. There is also a substantial amount of cloudiness this morning over the entire eastern half of the US which made all of the smoke difficult to see. 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