DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 0130Z March 18, 2012
Update for Dust/Sand in TX Smoke: Eastern Gulf of Mexico: A 9 km wide line of moderately dense smoke that originated from a fire in far NW Hernando county FL has detached and is located along 28.6N between 83W to 85W (approx 135km) moving due west. N Arkansas/S Missouri: A moderately dense to dense plume of smoke originated from a fire in extreme NW Saline very near the Perry/Garland county lines. The more dense smoke appears to be slightly higher in elevation and is moving more NE than N and is moving into southern MO. This dense area extends from Fulton to Conway county and is about 15km wide. A broader area of thin to moderately dense smoke has been moving due north to NNE covering Marion to Conway county. Sand/Dust: S New Mexico: Due to the approaching deep cyclone currently over Central CA... deep Swly flow is kicking up dust/sand from the deserts of far northern Chihuahua. The plume extends about 200km to the NE to a point just south of the White Sands desert. The plume is thin in density with possible moderately dense between US-70 and US-54 in Otero county, NM... this plume is likely affecting El Paso, TX as well. West Texas/N Panhandle/OK Panhandle: Blowing loose soils from the southern and central portions of the TX panhandle could be seen in the last 2 or 3 images indicating the blowing dust/soils are likely quite low in density but can be seen covering nearly all of the western and northern panhandle into the OK panhandle. Gallina THIS TEXT PRODUCT IS PRIMARILY INTENDED TO DESCRIBE SIGNIFICANT AREAS 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.osdpd.noaa.gov/ml/land/hms.html GIS: http://www.firedetect.noaa.gov/viewer.htm KML: http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/FIRE/kml.html ANY QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS REGARDING THIS PRODUCT SHOULD BE SENT TO SSDFireTeam@noaa.gov