DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1645Z August 13, 2023
SMOKE: United States/Alaska/Canada/Atlantic Ocean... Significant cloud cover was present over portions of Alaska and northwestern Canada which greatly limited information through satellite imagery on some of the fires and smoke which has been prevalent over this region for weeks. Moderate to thick density smoke was still visible through breaks in the clouds and around the periphery of the cloud cover over some of northeastern Alaska and extending to the east of there over far northwestern and north central Canada. The thicker smoke then curved to the southeast and south over Hudson Bay and northern and central Ontario. Cloud cover around the cluster of fires southeast of Hudson Bay over western Quebec limited information on the extent and density of the smoke in that area though a patch of thicker smoke was seen near and to the northeast of these fires briefly. Areas of thinner density smoke primarily from the Canadian fires were seen across the central and eastern U.S. and extending over some of the western Atlantic. Oregon/Washington... The Bedrock wildfire in west central Oregon was emitting moderate to thick density smoke which moved to the west during the morning reaching the coast of west central and southwestern Oregon. Additional moderate to thick density smoke from the Lookout Fire located northeast of the Bedrock Fire was also seen spreading to the west. Farther to the north, moderate to thick density smoke from the Sourdough Fire in northwestern Washington moved to the west and southwest passing north of Seattle. Thinner density smoke from this fire eventually merged with smoke from the west central Oregon fires off the west coast of Oregon and northwest California. DUST: Central and Eastern Caribbean Region/Bahamas/Atlantic Ocean... Some very thin density Saharan dust was still barely visible this morning across the Caribbean Sea, Cuba, some of the Bahamas, and a relatively small portion of the Atlantic east of the Bahamas. More significant dust was noted well east of the Caribbean region farther to the east over the Atlantic and closer to and over western 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