June 11, 2023 - Wildfire Smoke Blankets East Coast

Wildfire Smoke
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Wildfire smoke from Canada has passed over the northeastern U.S.
multiple times each summer in recent years, but it often goes unnoticed
because it is relatively high in the atmosphere. That was not the case
in June 2023. In the first week of the month, large amounts of smoke
from fires in Quebec poured south into the eastern U.S. and degraded
the quality of surface-level air that tens of millions of people
breathe.

Winds typically move smoke from fires in Quebec toward the east and out
to sea. But in June 2023, a persistent coastal low centered near Prince
Edward Island instead steered smoke south into the United States. This
image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on
NASA’s Terra satellite shows smoke sweeping over parts of the
northeastern United States on June 7, 2023. The brown smoke, high in
particulate matter, was particularly dense over New York, Pennsylvania,
and northern New Jersey, where it obscured the land from view.

Smoke reaching the northeastern United States from Canada in 2023 from
fires raging in western Canada has mostly arrived at fairly high
altitudes. But since the fires in Quebec are relatively close to the
northeast U.S., a much larger proportion of the smoke arrived in
surface-level air. Around the time of the image, AirNow air quality
monitors measured levels of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) soaring
above 400 micrograms per cubic meter of air in Syracuse, New York—the
highest on record for the city since routine measurements began in
1999.

At 9 a.m. Eastern Time on June 8, air quality monitors in parts of
Pennsylvania recorded levels deemed “hazardous” (code maroon) on the
EPA’s Air Quality Index (AQI) scale. The AQI for large cities such as
New York City, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. registered in the
“very unhealthy” range (code purple). The prior day, a monitor near
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, recorded a 24-hour average AQI of “hazardous,”
which is thought to be extremely rare in the region.

As of the morning of June 10, 144 wildfires continued to burn in
Quebec, with nearly 14,000 people in that province under evacuation
orders. With more than 860 personnel fighting the blazes, with regular
firefighting units enhanced with assistance from Canadian Armed Forces
and international assistance, progress has been made and beating back
some of the flames.

Shifting winds has also helped improve air quality in the United
States. According to AirNow, as of June 10 smoke from wildfires in
Western Canada and Quebec have both pushed south, covering a wide swath
of the U.S. from Montana to Central Florida and far over the Atlantic
Ocean. However, the Air Quality Index is much improved. Mechanicsburg,
Indiana registered one of the worst AQIs on Saturday morning, at 149 or
Code Orange (Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups). Except for a pocket near
that town, most of the rest of the smoke-covered region is in the
“Moderate” (Code Yellow) range. Parts of New York, including Long
Island, where the AQI peaked at over 420 on June 7, registered an AQI
of 6 (Code Green, “Good”) on June 10.

Image Facts
Satellite: Terra
Date Acquired: 6/7/2023
Resolutions: 1km (202.6 KB), 500m (627.8 KB), 250m (1.9 MB)
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit: MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC



https://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2023-06-11

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