Friday, May 11, 2012

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1445Z May 11, 2012

Dust:
Northern/Canadian Rockies through Northern Great Plains/Southern Canadian
Prairie:
A broad area of thin mid to upper level Asian dust can be seen along
the eastern side of the large ridge anchored over the US West Coast and
Southern BC...into the trof and through to a shortwave trof moving into
Ontario from Manitoba.   This trof with suspended dust extends south
across MT and ND.  Within this trof a narrow ribbon of moderate to dense
area can be seen stringed out across central Alberta down to the eastern
ridges of the Rockies in MT around Missoula to Helena then turning NE
extending across Glasgow, MT into extreme SE Saskatchewan across to
southern Lake Winnipegosis.  This ribbon is on average about 50km wide.
A second narrow and less dense ribbon oriented SW to NE extends from
Broadus, MT to Winnipeg and is about 30-50km wide too.   All dust/sand
within this trof is steadily moving E with little bit of SE component
particularly on the western side of the trof/east side of the ridge.

Smoke:
South Texas/N Mexico/Western Gulf of Mexico:
A very large area of thin to moderate smoke from numerous agricultural
fires across the Yucatan Peninsula, Southern Mexico, and Northern Central
America is covering the western portions of the Gulf of Mexico west of
93W up as far north as 25N (into  severe convective squall line just off
the Texas coast and as far west as the spine of the Sierra Madre Oriental.
Thin smoke is moving due east off the plateau from a fire near 26N102.5W
in South Central Coahuila and is covering much of northern Nuevo Leon
into far S. Texas overrunning the low level smoke from the south (making
it tough to distinguish where one area begins and the other ends).

Gallina

THIS TEXT PRODUCT IS PRIMARILY INTENDED TO DESCRIBE SIGNIFICANT
AREAS SMOKE ASSOCIATED WITH ACTIVE FIRES AND SMOKE WHICH HAS BECOME
DETACHED FROM THE FIRES AND DRIFTED SOME DISTANCE AWAY FROM THE SOURCE
FIRE..TYPICALLY OVER THE COURSE OF ONE OR MORE DAYS. AREAS OF BLOWING DUST
ARE ALSO DESCRIBED. USERS ARE ENCOURAGED TO VIEW A GRAPHIC DEPICTION OF
THESE AND OTHER PLUMES WHICH ARE LESS EXTENSIVE AND STILL ATTACHED TO
THE SOURCE FIRE 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
ANY QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS REGARDING THIS PRODUCT 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.