The smoke and haze around Central Alabama has been very thick this morning, in fact, the air quality sensors that the Alabama Department of Environmental Management monitors were showing a particle pollution count of 180 in north Birmingham this morning! That’s unhealthy air for sure!
The good news is that an east wind is clearing East Alabama of the smoky air, but it’s still rough-going in Birmingham and Tuscaloosa for the rest of the morning.
One very useful tool in tracking hazy, smoky air like this is a visible satellite image. Below, you’ll see two features highlighted on this morning’s visible image: the wildfire smoke plume from Georgia and a neat terrain-induced cloud formation in East Alabama. The smoke is to the left of the blue line, and you can look at the tip of the yellow arrow to find the orgraphically-induced clouds near Mt. Cheaha:
Visible Satellite (8:00 AM)
Cheaha SkyCam Image (8:20 AM)
The clouds over Cheaha are very localized to those higher mountains south of Anniston. They are caused by the cooler, more moist air blowing in from the east. As that air climbs the mountain, it cools and the water vapor contained in that air mass begins to condense and form clouds. This orographic process happens every day, but since Alabama’s highest mountains are only between 2200 and 2500 feet, normally, the air is not normally forced to a high enough level in the atmosphere to produce a cloud!
