DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0200Z March 25, 2016
SMOKE: Western Gulf/Lower Mississippi River Valley/Midwest: An expansive area of an aerosol composed of elevated dust/sand and remnant smoke was observed in satellite imagery and spanned from the western Gulf of Mexico through the Lower Mississippi River Valley into the Midwest. The smoke originated from yesterday's brush fires in northern Texas, the Kansas/Oklahoma border and yesterday's fires in Mexico while the dust/sand came from the White Sands National Monument in south central New Mexico and dry lake beds in Texas as well as dust in northwest New Mexico, northeast Arizona and Texas. This aerosol was seen moving towards the southeast and the full extent of this aerosol is obscured by cloud cover covering most of the eastern half of the US and Gulf of Mexico. Central Plains: Multiple fires and smoke plumes were seen across the Central Plains this evening in satellite imagery. All of the smoke plumes were traveling towards the south-southeast while the Anderson Creek Grass fire produced the majority of the light to medium density smoke. DUST: Western Gulf/Lower Mississippi River Valley/Midwest: Mixed with smoke from fires in Oklahoma/Kansas/Texas yesterday, an area of elevated dust/sand could be seen in morning imagery stretching from the western Gulf of Mexico through the Lower Mississippi River Valley into the Midwest. The dust/sand came from the White Sands National Monument in south central New Mexico and dry lake beds in Texas as well as dust in northwest New Mexico, northeast Arizona and Texas. Pacific Northwest/Southern Intermountain West: In between cloud cover a large area of elevated dust was observed from the Pacific Northwest into the southern portion of the Intermountain West. his dust likely originated from Asia and was moving towards the southeast. Clouds in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho obscured the full extent of this area of dust. -Cronin 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