U.S. Air Quality

Montserrat volcano spews ash; US remains calm and clean

Today, air quality conditions over US haven't changed much since yesterday. Good air quality except for California and Oregon which remains in the moderate-unhealthy (code orange) range. For some reason, AIRNow AQI loops for US and California were not really updated but (top, left) image shows what we have for today. HMS at NOAA has been reporting moderate to dense smoke over California since yesterday due to Humboldt County wildfire, which is very likely the source of the current AQI in California and the higher AOD values (top, right).

Montserrat volcano located in the northern part of the Lesser Antilles, in the Caribbean sea, has showed some high level activity in the past days as discussed in the Mesoamerican and Caribbean Air Quality blog and in the Montserrat Volcano Observatory. Today we see in MODIS Terra true color image the plume of ash (bottom,left) and NOAA OMI shows us the increase in SO2 concentration (bottom, right).