Sunday, April 20, 2014

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0045Z April 21, 2014

Smoke:
Upper Mississippi River Valley:
Along the edges of high cloud cover in S MN and N WI thin smoke from
prior day's output from fires (mostly in E KS) across KS, IA, and SE
NEB can be detected moving slowly N within a broader SWly flow that is
moving the smoke NE.   Likely smoke covers much of IA as well though is
obscured by cloud cover.

Dust/other:
US West:
As described below a very large area of milky/hazy conditions cover
much of the northern 2/3rds of CA, all of NV and UT, S ID, portions of
WY into SD moving NE.  Much can be traced across the Pacific Ocean back
to sources across E Asia (China/Mongolia/S Russian Siberia)

Gallina

Earlier today:
SMOKE
Central Plains:
An area of light density smoke was detected from eastern Nebraska
extending to the east northeast covering much of Iowa, southeast Minnesota
and western Wisconsin. The area is somewhat nebulous due to clouds in the
area which make determination of the extent of the smoke difficult. The
smoke was generated by the continued agricultural burning in the region.

DUST/OTHER
West Coast
A broad area of light density aerosol was seen over much of the eastern
Pacific off the west coast of the US, although the aerosol seemed to
be most concentrated off the Washington/Oregon coast and also off the
coast south of San Francisco. Aerosol models from NASA and the Naval
Research lab suggest that the aerosol is likely a mix of dust and sulfates
transported across the Pacific from east Asia.

South Central Canada:
A similar pulse of light aerosol as detected off the West Coast was also
seen over south central and southeast Saskatchewan. Whether this extended
into northeast Montana and northwest North Dakota was not discernible
due to cloud cover. Aerosol models suggest that this is also likely a
mix of dust and sulfate.

Ruminski

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.ospo.noaa.gov/Products/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.