DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1500Z August 23, 2026
SMOKE: Canada… Wildfires in the Northwest Territories continued to burn this morning. Despite heavy cloud cover, these fires were observed producing individual heavy-density smoke plumes that traveled eastward. Smoke from today’s fires and remnant smoke from previous days in southern British Columbia combined into a regional plume of heavy-density smoke that traveled with the cloud column eastward across central Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. A layer of moderate-density smoke spread from the Northwest Territories, merging with smoke from British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest before traveling southeastward across all of Central Canada and into the Great Lakes region of CONUS. A broad layer of light-density smoke covered nearly all of Canada before merging with smoke from CONUS. CONUS/Pacific Ocean/Atlantic Ocean… Wildfires across the Pacific Northwest, including Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, continued to produce localized heavy-density smoke plumes. A regional layer of moderate-density smoke was observed extending southeastward over the Northern Plains, the Upper Midwest, and the Great Lakes. A separate layer of remnant moderate-density smoke extended from the Lower Mississippi Valley into the Gulf coast and parts of the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic. A large layer of light-density smoke covered nearly all of CONUS before drifting eastward into the Atlantic Ocean, westward into the Pacific Ocean, northward to join with light-density smoke over Canada, and southward to join with smoke over the Gulf of America and northwestern Mexico. California… The Timber Fire in Monterey County, California was observed producing localized moderate-density smoke that extended southeastward along the shoreline and into the Pacific Ocean. Mexico/Gulf of America… A layer of remnant light-density smoke from fires in the Pacific Northwest of CONUS, as well as industrial activity in Mexico, was observed across of north-central Mexico, Baja California, and the northern Gulf of America, before becoming obscured by heavy cloud cover in south-central and southern Mexico. Cuba… Isolated fires in Cuba were observed producing localized light-density smoke plumes drifting eastward. Gaskill 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