Prompts winter weather advisories as cold air moves in Friday night

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The thick elevated smoke layer above Minnesota blotting out the sun again Tuesday is not a random event. The data clearly shows climate change is increasing the number of smoky sky days above Minnesota.

Tuesday’s smoke plumes overhead emanate from 

 burning in the western U.S. and Canada. 

Just won't ease up

The smoke plumes are clearly visible from space. You can see them fanning out across the U.S. Tuesday on NOAA’s GOES-16 visible satellite loop.

The smoke layer over Minnesota today is nearly as thick as parts of California and the western U.S. NOAA’s HRRR model vertically integrated smoke product shows the plumes streaming across the Upper Midwest Tuesday.

 have burned in the western U.S. so far in 2020. And we’re still in the midst of the western fire season.

The link between a hotter, drier climate, and increased wildfires in the western U.S. is well documented. 

What does the data show? Here’s a clip from a 2016 

increase in smoky sky days above Minnesota 

in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics finds nine to 12 days per month between June and September with smoke plumes overhead in the Upper Midwest.

And that smoke is reaching ground-level more often resulting in a doubling of air quality alert days in Minnesota. 

Today’s smoke is aloft over Minnesota and 

Forest ‘management’ and climate change

Some argue forest management practices are more responsible for bigger western fires than climate change.  Here’s the problem with that argument. 

Even a poorly managed forest will not exhibit currently observed fire behavior in a cooler wetter climate. It’s hard to burn a cool wet forest, or a forest with green wood and low “fuel aridity.”

World-renowned Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe has a great analogy.

So the evidence is clear. The increasing frequency of smoke plumes we are seeing above Minnesota in recent years is a result of climate change-driven wildfires.

Weather and Climate News

Updraft® - Minnesota Weather News

Paul Huttner

Author

Thick smoke plumes drifting across Minnesota from western wildfires are blotting out the sun Tuesday.

Thick elevated smoke layer above the Twin Cities Tuesday

Paul Huttner/MPR News

NASA/ESRI

NOAA/College of Dupage

NOAA HRRR model vertically integrated smoke product 

NOAA

Number of days per month with smoke overhead

Why climate change is producing more frequent thick smoke over Minnesota

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