DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1630Z August 8, 2023
SMOKE: United States/Alaska/Canada/Northwestern Atlantic Ocean/Northern and Western Gulf of Mexico/Northern Mexico/Pacific Ocean off the Coast of Baja and California… Major widespread wildfire activity continues especially across western and northwestern Canada along with central and east central Alaska. Another significant cluster of wildfires was present over west central Quebec to the southeast of Hudson Bay. All of these wildfires were primarily responsible for a massive area of smoke which covered much of Canada, the northern half of Alaska, as well as much of the U.S., some of the western Atlantic, the northern Gulf of Mexico, and northern Mexico. Within the much larger area of thinner density smoke were thicker batches. The largest of these, attributed to the significant number of wildfires in northwestern Canada and Alaska blanketed the northern half of Alaska and much of northwestern Canada. Additional moderate to thick smoke primarily from these fires was seen over southwestern and south central Canada, and the northern tier of the U.S. from Washington to the Great Lakes region. Cloud cover over far western and southwestern Canada though did interfere with some information on the extent and density of any smoke which might be present there. The more dense smoke from the fires in Quebec was confined to western Quebec and far eastern Ontario. Utah/Colorado/Arizona/New Mexico/Southern Plains... A large wildfire in southwestern Utah was producing a moderate to thick density smoke plume which spread to the east gradually thinning in density as it crossed the Utah-Colorado border and continued in the direction of Denver. A few other wildfires in southwestern Colorado, central and east central Arizona, and west central New Mexico were responsible for some localized thicker smoke closer to these fires. Hawaii… Several wind fanned fires in central Maui and the northwest part of the Big Island were producing locally moderate density smoke plumes which quickly thinned in density and moved to the west and well off the coast of these islands. DUST: Central and Eastern Caribbean Region/Bahamas/Atlantic Ocean... The thinner density western portion of an area of Saharan dust has edged just a little more to the west over the past day and is still present over eastern Cuba, Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, the central and eastern Caribbean Sea, and the Atlantic Ocean just east of and now including some of the Bahamas. From these locations, the dust then extended well to the east across the tropical and subtropical Atlantic to the west coast of Africa. 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 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