Saturday, May 19, 2012

From Russia, Tooele, or Nevada with Love?

We should be in a fairly pristine post-frontal airmass today, but the visibility is relatively poor by Utah standards.

A hazy view of downtown Salt Lake from Neff's Canyon
It appears we have some smoke in the air, but from where?  Smoke from fires in Siberia penetrated earlier this week into the central and eastern US, as discussed on "The Smog Blog."  They even posted a great MODIS image showing smoke streaming out over the Bering Sea.

Image obtained from the U.S. Air Quality Smog Blog
(http://alg.umbc.edu/usaq/)
Perhaps some of that smoke has now found its way to Utah?

Perhaps the smoke is from less remote origin.  The Forest Service reports a few large "incidents" including a fire in Tooele County that has burned 1390 acres (fire 4 below), and one in Nevada (fire 2 below) that has scorched 17,200.

Source: USDA Forest Service
FInally, NOAA detects a fire in extreme NW Utah and a couple in eastern Oregon.

Source: http://www.firedetect.noaa.gov/viewer.htm
Maybe someone can dig into the satellite imagery and get a better handle on the source.  In any event, fire season is here already.

1 comment:

  1. Hi! nice blog.

    What do you predict snow will be like next season?

    ReplyDelete