DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1700Z August 29, 2020
SMOKE:
CONUS (aside from the SE)/south-central Canada/northern Mexico/North
Atlantic...
Wildfire activity throughout the western US (mainly California and Oregon)
and southeastern British Columbia continues to produce thick smoke,
maintaining a continental wide area of varying density smoke. The area
of smoke has its origins in mainly northern California and the Central
Valley, with smoke moving off initially toward the west. Then, the smoke
makes an abrupt turn off toward the east-northeast and continues over the
Intermountain West into the Northern Plains and the Prairie Provinces. The
layer then plunges south-southeast across the Central Plains and then
toward the east across the Mid-Mississippi and Ohio Valleys, where the
some has concentrated some. From here, the layer moves east-northeast
across the northern Mid-Atlantic, southern New England, and out into the
north Atlantic, where some of the smoke layer was starting to be ingested
by a deep trough over the Davis Strait while the rest was concentrating
within a high off to the south of the Maritime Provinces.
Four Corners...
Fire activity across Arizona is also the likely source of a region of
moderate smoke over Colorado and New Mexico. Some of the fire activity
was also producing light to moderate smoke this morning.
SAHARAN DUST:
Atlantic...
Saharan Dust that has been moving west across the tropical and subtropical
Atlantic has had portions of the layer move across much of the Caribbean
and even towards the Yucatan Peninsula. The thickest Saharan Dust was
still over the eastern and central tropical Atlantic and the eastern
subtropical Atlantic.
Hosley
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/data/land/fire/currenthms.jpg
GIS: ftp://satpsanone.nesdis.noaa.gov/FIRE/HMS/GIS/
KML: http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/land/fire/fire.kml (fire)
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/land/fire/smoke.kml (smoke)
ANY QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS REGARDING THIS PRODUCT SHOULD BE SENT TO:
SSDFireTeam@noaa.gov