Satellite remote sensing of boreal forest fires over Northeast Asia during May 2003

Massive smoke plume from forest fires reduced visibility on regional scale in Northeast Asia in May 2003 during boreal forest fire season in Siberia. Smoke aerosol events and their effects are investigated using satellite data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectro-radiometer (MODIS), Measurement of Pollution in the Troposphere (MOPITT), Clouds and the Earths Radiant Energy System (CERES), and Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) over Northeast Asia. Extensive forest fires were detected from MODIS fire product (MOD14) data over Siberia. Aerosol optical thickness (AOT) of the smoke aerosol from fires can be retrieved from the MODIS Level 1 data by using the Bremen Aerosol Retrieval (BAER) algorithm. The retrieved mean AOT ranged from 2 to 4 over smoke plume covering Northeast Asia. Over most of the Northeast Asia, CO concentrations was about 3.0 molecules/cm(2) in this region. The top-of-atmosphere (TOA) shortwave aerosol radiative forcing (SWARF) from CERES has been estimated. The mean TOA SWARF was about 130similar to290 W/m(2) over smoke aerosol plume, indicating an aerosol cooling effect.