DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE
IMAGERY THROUGH 0245Z, May 27, 2018.
SMOKE: Wyoming/Montana/Nebraska/North and South Dakota... Remnant thin density smoke from yesterday's big flare up of a fire in Piute County of south central Utah was visible spreading to the north and northeast across Wyoming into southeastern Montana and across portions of the Dakotas and Nebraska. Southeastern Canada/Maine... A swath of thin density smoke could be seen between breaks in the clouds and cloud free areas extending from the southern portion of Hudson Bay and northern Ontario across the southern half of Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. The smoke also appeared to graze the northern half of Maine though cloudiness farther to the south did interfere with smoke detection. This smoke was leftover from wildfires burning over the past few days over portions of Central, South Central, and Western Canada. Western and Central Canada/North Central US... Thick smoke was noted during the afternoon spreading to the east from fires in northeastern British Columbia and northeastern Alberta in western Canada. In addition, a much larger batch of mainly thin density smoke was seen stretching from the southern part of the Northwest Territories to northern Manitoba. Thin density smoke also affected southern Alberta, much of Saskatchewan, the southern half of Manitoba, and southwestern Ontario and across the US border from far northern Montana to Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Thick clouds over northeastern Manitoba and northwestern Ontario to southeastern Ontario limited smoke detection in satellite imagery. These large areas of thin density smoke were attributed to a number of recent wildfires burning over portions of Central, South Central, and Western Canada. Mexico/Central America... A large mass of thin to moderate density smoke associated with ongoing seasonal burning over portions of Mexico was seen stretching from just south of the southern New Mexico/southwestern Texas-Mexico border southward over much of western and southern Mexico and offshore to the south of Mexico over the Pacific. Patches of mainly thin density smoke were also noted farther to the east over southeastern Mexico and Guatemala. DUST: Southwestern US... A swath of mainly thin density blowing dust from a number of source regions extended from far southern California (near the Salton Sea) across southwestern and central Arizona. Additional blowing dust of thin density was visible over northeastern Nevada and into southeastern Utah. JS 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