DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0230Z August 23, 2012
US: Smoke producing wildfires in northern California, Oregon, and Idaho continues to spread east northeastward. An area of mostly moderate to dense smoke extends from northern California, northwest Nevada and southern Oregon into southern and central Idaho and southwest Montana. The smoke becomes mainly thin density across central and eastern Montana, northwest Wyoming and into North Dakota and northwest Minnesota and adjoining areas of southern Canada. A patchy area of thin remnant smoke was also drifting slowly eastward through southern Michigan, parts of Indiana and western Ohio and into Kentucky and Tennessee. Canada: Remnant smoke from a cluster of wildfires that have been burning for several days over northeast British Columbia, northern Alberta and southwest Northwest Territories was seen across the northern tier of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, although the full extent of the smoke was obscured due to clouds. A separate stripe of thin smoke was also noted along the northern Northwest Territories and Nunavut border. Blowing Dust: A broad area of light blowing dust from the Sahara has crossed the Atlantic and was seen from the east coast of Florida, across the Bahamas and extending toward Bermuda. Ruminski 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