California Wildfire Smoke Wrapped Up Into an Approaching Storm

Download Image Download Image of California Wildfires

The Suomi NPP satellite's VIIRS instrument took this image of smoke from California's wildfires being drawn northward into an approaching storm system off the U.S. Pacific Coast on December 11, 2017. The beige-colored smoke is visible in the lower-center portion of this image, while the comma-shaped storm system, known as a mid-latitude cyclone, is seen just to the west. Southerly winds ahead of the storm are pushing wildfire smoke several hundred miles northward, parallel to the coastline. The Thomas Fire in southern California has scorched more than 230,000 acres in recent days and is the fifth-largest in state history.

Although true-color images like this may appear to be photographs of Earth, they aren't. They are created by combining data from the three color channels on the VIIRS instrument sensitive to the red, green and blue (or RGB) wavelengths of light into one composite image. In addition, data from several other channels are often also included to cancel out or correct atmospheric interference that may blur parts of the image.

Where this page came from

This page was imported from NOAA Satellites (NESDIS). Published by NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service and, as a work of the United States government, in the public domain; pictures credited elsewhere are left out.

Nobody has written it yet — it is the source material at a new address, which is why search engines are asked to skip it and why no one earns from it. It is up for grabs: take it on, and it is yours to rewrite and to earn from.