DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1530Z September 12, 2012
Eastern Canada/Northeast US: A large area of thin smoke from ID/MT fires from this weekend has drifted over NE North America and into the north Atlantic. Currently it covers E Ontario/nearly all of Quebec, New York, New England, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, PEI and the eastern portion of Newfoundland...as well as covering the Gulf of Maine and about 50km off shore from New York to Cape Cod then about 200km SE of Nova Scotia. The smoke is moderately to dense in consistency across ME, MA, RI and in an E-W line from Cape Cod to 41N60W. This area is moving due South or just East of due South (SE across N ME) along the backside of the large Atlantic Trof. US Northwest: Nearly all smoke plumes are still connected to their source fires however, the large complexes along the MT/ID boarder and further west along the Salmon River Valley are producing dense smoke within all the valleys of the Bitterroot and Clearwater Ranges in ID into western MT but some thin to moderately dense smoke is leaking SE through the valleys between the Lost River, Lemhi and Beaverhead Mtn ranges pouring out into the upper Snake River plain where it is descending toward the SW Rupert and American Falls. Very little of the smoke from these fires is high enough in elevation to be moving east except for a small area over Yellowstone NP into N WY. The large fire complexes ringing the Colombian Plateau of Washington produced moderately dense smoke that moved due east last night but wind shifts have anticyclonically curled the smoke back toward the west and northwest banking it against the Cascade and Kettle River Range. Most of the smoke emitted late last night has been trapped in the valleys and moving due west through the gaps to the valleys west of the Cascade Range. The Pole Creek Fire of Central Oregon Cascades is producing thin smoke that is moving west into the Willamette Valley but continues SW across the coastal range near Cape Blanco but once off shore covers the coastal region of SW OR and NW CA (though some of this is likely contribution from Ward and Bagley fires of N CA as well). 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