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Dust, Fires, and Smoke in Northeast Asia

Smoke from a large grass fire in the Inner Mongolia province of northern China is streaming a large light brown plume of smoke that was seen by NASA's Aqua satellite. In the same satellite image, NASA's Aqua saw a yellowish cloud of sand over eastern Russia, transported from Mongolia's Gobi Desert.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite captured this true-color image on April 20, 2012 at 5:15 UTC.

According to China.org.cn, the fire in the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia started on April 19, 2012 in a grassland in the city of Hulunbuir. Strong winds, evident in the length of the plume of smoke, stretching from south to north, have made firefighting efforts difficult. The red dots indicate the areas of fires.

To the northeast a yellowish cloud is desert dust. It is a common occurrence, where weather systems sweep up dust and sand from the deserts of Mongolia, especially the Gobi desert, and transport them to the east.

Image: NASA Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team. Text: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Rob Gutro