August 7, 2021 - Smoke from Siberian Wildfires

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A vast, thick, and acrid blanket of smoke emitted from hundreds of
forest fires covered most of Russia on August 6, 2021.

This true-color image, which was acquired by Moderate Resolution
Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board NASA’s Aqua satellite on
August 6, was created using data from four passes of the satellite over
the region. The smoke, which was so thick that most of the land below
was obscured from view, stretches about 2,000 miles (3,200 km) from
east to west and 2,500 miles (4,000 km) from south to north—but it
captures only a small part of the smoke from the Russian fires. This
week, wildfire smoke has travelled more than 3,000 km (1,864 mi) from
Yakutia to reach the North Pole, a feat that appears to be a first in
recorded history. The Chinese news agency, Xinhua, reported that
Siberian smoke clouded the skies of parts of Mongolia, including Ulan
Bator, the capital city, on August 4—a distance of more than 1,200
miles (2,000 km). On August 6, a broad band of smoke from the
wildfires, which appeared to be entrained with the clouds, could be
seen over Nunavut, Canada and western Greenland.

While the exact amount of forest burnt so far this year across Russia
is difficult to ascertain, with different numbers recited by different
sources, the emissions of carbon dioxide estimated by the European
Union’s Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service estimates that the
emissions since June total more than 505 megatons of carbon dioxide
equivalent. The 2020 fire season was very severe, but the estimated
total carbon dioxide equivalent came to 450 megatons for the entire
season.

This smoke primarily comes from the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) in
Siberia. It is the largest republic in Russia and is heavily covered by
boreal forest (also known as taiga). The northern part of Sakha
Republic has recorded some of the coldest temperatures on Earth, but
this winter has set record high temperatures for the region. On August
2, the Siberian Times reported on the intense, blinding, smoke
experienced by residents of Yakutia as wildfires scorched the land.
Their report read, “the Republic of Sakha, Russia’s largest territory,
used to be known as the Kingdom of Permafrost, (now) is turning into
the Capital of Wildfires”. At that time, they estimated that two
million hectares of the Republic had been engulfed in flames this year.

Image Facts
Satellite: Aqua
Date Acquired: 8/6/2021
Resolutions: 1km (5.4 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=2021-08-07

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