DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0142Z August 17, 2022
SMOKE: North Central and Northwestern U.S./Southwestern Canada/Pacific off the Northwest U.S. Coast... Wildfires were detected over southern British Columbia, western Montana, northern and central Idaho, central Washington, western Oregon, and northern California resulting in a broad area of light to moderate density smoke which covered portions of the northwestern and north central U.S., far southwestern and south central Canada, and off the northwest U.S. coast over the far eastern Pacific. The smoke also mixed with smoke from the northwestern Canadian wildfires somewhere over the north central U.S. and south central Canada. Patches of thicker density smoke were visible closer to most of the wildfires this evening. Northwestern and Central Canada... Wildfires scattered across the Northwest Territories and northern Alberta were responsible for an area of mostly light to moderate density smoke which was visible today moving to the east and southeast over parts of Saskatchewan, Manitoba, east into Ontario and out over the Atlantic Ocean south of Greenland. Patches of thicker density smoke were visible closer to most of the wildfires this evening. DUST: Tropical and Subtropical Atlantic/Caribbean Sea/Central America/Mexico/western Gulf of Mexico/Texas… Saharan dust was visible in satellite imagery over the open tropical and subtropical Atlantic with the far western leading edge now just beginning to impact the far eastern Caribbean islands. Dust was also observed extending westward through the Caribbean Sea across northern Central America, Mexico, and the western Gulf of Mexico into Texas. Eglin 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 map: https://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/land/fire/currenthms.jpg Smoke data: https://satepsanone.nesdis.noaa.gov/pub/FIRE/web/HMS/Smoke_Polygons Fire data: https://satepsanone.nesdis.noaa.gov/pub/FIRE/web/HMS/Fire_Points ANY QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS REGARDING THIS PRODUCT SHOULD BE SENT TO: SSDFireTeam@noaa.gov