Weather S01E01: Predicting Wildfire Smoke
Channel: Mountain Parameters
Date: 13/07/2023

When you actively maintain a 'State of Readiness' to prepare for an evacuation alert (as we do), wildfires are front of mind. While we have not yet had to evacuate, we have come close, and living with wildfire smoke is an annual practice for many of us.
Timeline:
00:00 A picture of our local smoke today (July 13, 2023).
00:10 Firesmoke.ca
02:32 NOAA, RAP and HRRR products
06:52  Weather Underground 
09:28  College of Dupage, GOES and ABI models
22:33 correlating GOES and local smoke maps 
25:33 comparing GOES to NWS Radar

Not all of the resources are covered in the video. For a comprehensive list, refer to Part II, and see links and notes below:

Referenced links and resources:
Forecasting: (No model is perfect, and it's usually best to view trends where smoke is getting worse or better.  Take a look at the AQI in your area, and then you can use the model to see if it looks like your area will improve or worsen through the day/night)
At the 4:41 mark you'll notice there is a slideshow that gives the HRRR smoke forecast out to 48 hours (to get it to go out to 48 hrs, you need to play with the dates in the 'Date' drop-down box). If you live north of the top line of the coverage area shown in the thumbnail, you are out of luck for HRRR, but you can still use the RAP. The RAP-NCEP-Smoke model* shows all of North America, the NE side of Russia, and parts of Western Europe. In our experience, the NOAA NCEP models are more consistently reliable than the firesmoke.ca forecast (forget about using the WeatherUnderground product, it needs a lot more work before it is useable). However, finding it can be a bit of a challenge. For starters, it is best to refer to this tutorial: https://www.weather.gov/mfr/HRRR_smoke_tutorial

Then you can generate the slideshow by starting on this page and selecting the values that will return the results you are after:
https://rapidrefresh.noaa.gov/hrrr/HRRRsmoke/ (For continental USA and Southern Canada)
or:
https://rapidrefresh.noaa.gov/RAPsmoke/ (North America, the NE side of Russia, and parts of Western Europe)
It's not really intuitive the first time you use them. For example, 
- if you want to forecast to go out to 48 hours, you need to keep selecting the values from the 'Date'  drop down box until you see the Table below it fill all the box values out to the right side of the screen (the tutorial addresses this procedure).
- if you want to see the animation for the vertically integrated smoke, you click on the checkmark beside 'vertically integrated smoke', and then sit back and wait while it generates an animated slideshow for you in a new browser tab.
* The RAP-NCEP model has a further advantage in that if the fires that are generating all the smoke are north of 50, you can get a better idea of how to expect that vorticity will affect the dispersion of the smoke plumes.

https://earth.Nullschool.net: (good for seeing current vorticity and how it affects smoke)
- hold down your mouse button to rotate the globe
- double click at your approximate location on the map
- drag again with your mouse pointer to reposition your aspect view, and then double click again to keep zooming into your location
- click the mouse to reposition your location and refer to the co-ordinates on the lower left until you have achieved the location position you want
- open the menu by clicking on the 'earth' tab lower left corner
- on the 'mode' line, select 'particulates' (if you want to see other values such as CAPE, switch the mode to 'air')
- again on the mode line, if you want to visualize the firesmoke pollutants such as sulphur and nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide, select 'chem' instead of 'particulates'.
- Hint: if you want to visualize the location of the fires and how the vorticity is affecting your area, use 'chem' and select COsc, and you will be able to see more clearly which fires are affecting your location, and why.
For more details on using nullschool, visit the excellent tutorial at:
https://pressbooks.bccampus.ca/physgeoglabmanual1/back-matter/appendix-4-earth-nullschool-net-tutorial/

VIIRS 375 m Active Fire Product (Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite)
https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/usfs/map/#d:24hrs;@-100.0,40.0,4z
If you are outside of North America, use this link:
https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@0.0,0.0,3z
Currently active fires and historical listings.

Firesmoke.ca.
https://firesmoke.ca/forecasts/current/

NOAA Smoke Model:
https://hwp-viz.gsd.esrl.noaa.gov/smoke/index.html#

Weather Underground, Wundermap:
https://www.wunderground.com/wundermap

College of DuPage, Satellite and Radar
https://weather.cod.edu/satrad/

National Weather Service radar:
https://radar.weather.gov/

Windy.com:
https://www.windy.com/

Additional resources:
- Nutrien's 'Morning Minute', hosted by Eric Snodgrass (watch this every morning when you start your day):
https://www.youtube.com/@Nutrien_AgSolutions