May 26, 2008
Haze in the Mid-Atlantic and Texas
It's been a beautiful holiday weekend here in our Nation's Capital, with sunny skies and temperatures in the 70s and 80s ºF. As the weekend has progressed, however, air quality has deteriorated somewhat. It's a bit hazy today in the Mid-Atlantic, with PM2.5 levels in the Code Yellow range across much of the region. Today's MODIS Aqua true color image below shows the haze beginning to increase across Virginia and North Carolina.
It's also hazy in Texas, as seen in the image below on the left, which is today's MODIS Aqua true color image overlaid with the 21 UTC AQI conditions. The image below on the right is the corresponding GASP AOD image from 2045 UTC, which shows elevated AOD across western Texas and into western Oklahoma. Despite the haze, air quality is still good this evening in most of the region, except for Moderate PM2.5 conditions in Midland-Odessa, near the Anthony Fire. It's possible that this fire is contributing to the elevated PM and AOD conditions, but since it is a small fire - only 300 acres - it's probably not making a big impact. It's more likely that elevated AOD in the GASP image is from advection of smoke aloft from the seasonal Central American fires.
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