DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1845Z July 15, 2014
SMOKE: Western and Central Canada/U.S: An extensive area smoke, much of it moderate to heavy, is seen covering much of northern Canada from Northwest Territories to Hudson Bay and Nunavut. The smoke also covers most of Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. The moderate and dense areas are mostly north of the central portions of the prairie provinces. The smoke has also dropped south into North Dakota and eastern Montana as well as Washington. All of this smoke is from the long burning wildfires in northern Canada around Great Slave and Great Bear Lakes and the more recent fires which have developed in central British Columbia. Additional fires that were mainly started by lightning in Oregon and Idaho have generated smoke across much of central Oregon into southern Idaho and western Wyoming. This area of smoke is mostly light density. The Bully fire in northwest California southwest of Redding has generated a smoke plume which mainly extends to the west northwest and appears to have mainly settled into valley locations. DUST: Gulf of Mexico: A surge of Saharan dust can be seen over central/southern portions of the Gulf of Mexico. The dust is currently moving northward towards the Gulf Coast. 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