Massive Wall of Smoke on U.S. West Coast – Easily Visible From 1 Million Miles Away From Earth

Wildfire Smoke September 9 2020 Annotated

September 9, 2020

Wildfires continue to rage in the western United States. On September 9, 2020, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured this natural-color image of thick smoke streaming from a line of intense fires in Oregon and California. Many communities in the region are facing extremely poor and sometimes hazardous air quality.

Wildfire Smoke Earth September 9 2020

September 9, 2020

The smoke was so thick and widespread that it was easily visible from 1.5 million kilometers (1 million miles) away from Earth. When NASA’s Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) on NOAA’s DSCOVR satellite acquired the image below, large areas of Oregon, California, and the northeastern Pacific Ocean were obscured by smoke.

NASA Earth Observatory images by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS/LANCE and GIBS/Worldview and data from DSCOVR EPIC.

2 Comments on "Massive Wall of Smoke on U.S. West Coast – Easily Visible From 1 Million Miles Away From Earth"

  1. What a sad but at the same time interesting image to study.

  2. Will it kill us????!!

Leave a comment

Email address is optional. If provided, your email will not be published or shared.