THROUGH 1700Z August 23, 2023
United States/Canada/Mexico/Northwestern Atlantic Ocean/Northeastern Pacific Ocean... Smoke from the numerous wildfires burning across western Canada continued to produce a large area of dense to very dense smoke that extended over southern sections of the Northwest Territories, central/northeastern sections of British Columbia, northern/central sections of Alberta into northern/central Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and into central Quebec. Dense smoke also covered parts of southwestern British Columbia, extending out over the adjacent Pacific Ocean and south to Vancouver Island. Additional dense smoke extended along the California, Oregon, Washington coast and into the Pacific and north/northeast across most of Washington/Oregon into western/northern Idaho, western Montana and southeastern British Columbia and southern Alberta. This smoke was from the wildfire near Eureka, California. Overall, light smoke from the wildfires in western Canada, Northwest US, northern California extended across most of Canada except the far eastern regions and into the most of the US, northern/central Gulf of Mexico, extreme northern Mexico except for the far northeast US, parts of western Texas, southwest US, and sections of southern/western California. DUST: Africa/Atlantic Ocean… Saharan dust was observed over the eastern Atlantic Ocean, near Africa and the Iberian Peninsula and stretching and getting lighter around 42W. The heaviest of the dust was near the African coast. An additional east to west elongated area of dust extends westward along the northern South America coast into the southern/eastern Caribbean Sea and upward to in/around 18N in certain areas. JK 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