April 10, 2009
Oklahoma fires leading to unhealthy air conditions (code red)
Since yesterday, the fires situation in Oklahoma and Texas got much worse. AIRNow (left) shows moderate to unhealthy conditions (code orange) in Texas, Mississippi and Northeast US and unhealthy conditions (code red) in Lawton, OK. The the ozone levels were moderate in Texas, Northeast US, California and Florida.
An image from yesterday from NOAA-15 satellite (right) showed a mix of smoke and dust which was described in Meloe's post.
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Today we see in Terra MODIS images (top, right) this mix of smoke and clouds over Texas and, zooming in Nuevo Leon, Mexico (top, left), we can see this big area of fires helping to enhance the moderate conditions in Texas. MODIS AOD map for Texas is showed in the bottom left and on the right hand side is the fire map from NOAA showing plumes of smoke spreading out to the Northeast from the fires in Oklahoma and Texas which are not only worsening the air quality, but unfortunately leaving many people injured and homeless as reported by CNN and News9.
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