Saturday, August 17, 2013

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0100Z August 18, 2013

Labrador Strait/North Atlantic:
Very thin smoke covers much of the Labrador Strait and south of Greenland
across the North Atlantic... this is remnant smoke from prior week's
Canadian fire output.  This was smoke that  mainly moved north from the
sources across the Arctic Islands and down across Baffin and northern
Quebec, though a narrow ribbon across Newfoundland is likely sourced
from N Manitoba fires and ID/MT fires and moved across the northern
US. (Please see Great Lakes section below).

New England/Great Lakes/Missouri:
A narrow strip of thin smoke from the prior week's output from the
ID/MT fires had originally been moving east, but with a shearing out
upper low/trof over the Eastern US... this deformation zone smoke has
begun to move westward again crossing S ME,NH, VT, N NY, Lake Ontario,
S MI and eventually across C IL and much of MO and N AR, where the smoke
consolidates and becomes a bit more dense.

Upper Great Plains/Front Range of Rockies/S Great Plains:
One half of the large bulk of moderately dense smoke sourced from the N
California, SW OR, ID, NW WY, and MT fires is being pulled SSE across
E WY, E CO, W NEB, W KS and due south across the OK and TX panhandles
into south central TX...due to the retrograding upper low over MO.
There are pockets of very dense smoke embedded particularly over the OK
and TX panhandles.

Northern US Great Plains/Southern Canadian Prairies:
The other half of the large bulk of moderately dense smoke sourced from
the fires mentioned above has remained north of the highly amplified
ridging across IA/WI/S MN...in fact some is actually being pulled over
the ridge and back SW upon itself across SE ND/N MN.  Still this area is
much more dense to the point of very dense particularly across far E MT,
much of ND, S Manitoba into SW Ontario, clipping far NW MN.    With the
smoke folding upon itself across SD/ND/MN this should remain very dense
throughout the night into tomorrow morning....but additionally a large
portion will cross Ontario.

Canadian Territories:
An area of moderately dense smoke from prior day's emissions from fires
across N Saskatchewan/N Manitoba, NW Territories and Yukon Territory
remains relatively locked into place with a weak cyclone in N Alberta
pulling smoke back into Yukon Territory but deep SSWly flow across AK is
blocking further westward progression...so the smoke covers Yukon, NW
Territories and S continental Nunavut.   It does appear the fires have
significantly waned due to colder temps and wetter conditions... only
additional smoke being added today appears to be across the portions of
the NW Territories NW and W of Great Slave Lake.

Gallina

THIS TEXT PRODUCT IS PRIMARILY INTENDED TO DESCRIBE SIGNIFICANT AREAS
OF 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.