DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1700Z September, 2021
SMOKE: Lower 48 of the U.S/Far Eastern Pacific off the U.S. West Coast/Southwestern and South Central Canada/Extreme Southeastern Canada/Atlantic off the East Coast of the U.S. and Canada… Significant wildfires continue to burn in the western U.S. with a few smaller wildfires in southern British Columbia of southwestern Canada. This has resulted in substantial smoke production with a huge mass of varying density smoke seen in satellite imagery stretching from just off the U.S. west coast inland and to the east over the entire western and central U.S., along with a good portion of southwestern and south central Canada. Within this mass of smoke were large areas of thick smoke which blanketed sizable portions of the northwestern and central U.S., and south central Canada. Farther to the east, a band of thin to moderate density smoke along a frontal boundary stretched from Louisiana to the northeast to the central Appalachians. The thinner density smoke from the western U.S. and southern British Columbia wildfires may also extend farther to the northeast over the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast but cloud cover interfered with detection. Enough breaks in the clouds allowed for thinner density smoke to be seen across portions of the central and northern Atlantic all the way to near western Europe. DUST: Caribbean Region/Bahamas/Southern Florida/Eastern Gulf of Mexico… Thin Saharan dust was seen spreading slowly to the west across Puerto Rico and the eastern Caribbean region including the islands of the far eastern Caribbean. More significant Saharan dust was noted over western Africa and extending to the west over the tropical and subtropical Atlantic. Remnant thin density Saharan dust was becoming less discernible in satellite imagery over Hispaniola, Cuba, the Bahamas, the northwestern Caribbean, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and southern Florida. 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/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