October 27, 2020 - Smoke from Colorado over the Mediterranean

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   Smoke from Colorado over the Mediterranean
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   The 2020 Colorado fire season has been devastating and record-breaking.
   The three largest fires in Colorado history have all occurred this
   year. The third-largest fire, the Pine Gulch Fire, began on July 31 and
   torched 139,007 acres before it was fully contained on September 24. By
   October 26, that fire had been surpassed by two others: the Cameron
   Peak Fire, which has burned 208,663 acres and was 64 percent contained
   and the East Troublesome Fire, which has burned 192,560 acres and was
   15 percent contained. The Cameron Peak Fire began in August and is the
   largest fire in state history, the East Troublesome Fire, which is
   burning close to the Cameron Peak Fire, ignited on October 14 and has
   explosively grown to capture the number-two title. At least 11 fires
   continued to be active in the state on October 26.

   Not only have the acreage burnt been record-breaking, but the amount of
   smoke has been spectacular. When the East Troublesome Fire burst into
   explosive growth on October 21—growing 140,000 acres in 24 hours—it
   created a huge pyrocumulonimbus cloud that rose to about 40,000 feet.
   To be more descriptive, a NASA article entitled “Fire-breathing Storm
   Systems” describes it this way: “Pyrocumulonimbus is the fire-breathing
   dragon of clouds. A cumulonimbus without the “pyre” part is imposing
   enough—a massive, anvil-shaped tower of power reaching five miles (8
   km) high, hurling thunderbolts, wind and rain. Add smoke and fire to
   the mix an our have pyrocumulonimbus, an explosive storm cloud actually
   created by the smoke and heat from the fire”. Called “pyroCb” storms,
   they can funnel their smoke like a chimney into Earth’s stratosphere,
   allowing the smoke to be spread for thousands of miles.

   Which appears to be exactly what happened to the East Troublesome
   Fire’s pyroCB event. According to Ozone Mapping and Profiling Suite
   (OMPS) aerosol index, aerosol (smoke) can be seen flowing from the
   October 21 pyroCb in Colorado over the Atlantic Ocean to reach Europe
   and Africa on October 25.

   On October 25, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer
   (MODIS) on board NASA’s Aqua satellite captured a true-color image of
   the smoke from the East Troublesome Fire as it passed over the
   Mediterranean Sea. The smoke is the thickest over the tip of Italy, in
   the east, but also covers the islands of Sardinia and Corsica. Thin
   smoke can also be seen over Algeria and Tunisia.

   Image Facts
   Satellite:  Aqua
   Date Acquired: 10/25/2020
   Resolutions:  1km (545.4 KB),  500m (1.7 MB),  250m (5.1 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=2020-10-27
 
