DESCRIPTIVE TEXT NARRATIVE FOR SMOKE/DUST OBSERVED IN SATELLITE IMAGERY
THROUGH 1645Z December 21, 2023
AEROSOL/SMOKE: Bay of Campeche/Southern and Southeastern Mexico/Northwestern Central America/Pacific Ocean south of Mexico and Northwestern Central America… Patches of what are believed to be primarily thin density smoke were seen this morning over a portion of the Bay of Campeche and inland from there over some of southeastern Mexico. This smoke was linked to the oil rigs in the Bay of Campeche as well as to a somewhat more concentrated batch of seasonal fire activity occurring in the Mexican state of Veracruz in eastern Mexico. Farther to the south, areas of thin to moderate density aerosol were seen across some of southern and southeastern Mexico, northwestern Central America, and the Pacific Ocean south of the southern coast of Mexico and northwestern Central America. Since only minor fire activity was analyzed across the portions of Mexico and northwestern Central America which are upstream of these aerosols, it is believed that the vast majority of the aerosol is from industrial activities in Mexico and northwestern Central America. 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