Siberian smoke arrives in Idaho

At least twenty-three people have been killed in massive wildfires in the Siberia region of Russia, reports ABC News and The Associated Press. Nearly 5,000 people are homeless in wildfires that started from farmers burning off dead grass in preparation for this growing season.

Now that smoke is entering the sky above eastern Idaho and throughout the Inland Northwest.

“Farmers in thesteppeof southern Russia have anold traditionof burning dried grass in the spring to fertilize the soil for the new growing season,” NASA said. “That tradition became a nightmare in April 2015 when large numbers of agricultural fires escaped the control of their handlers and spread rapidly across the dry landscape. As wildfires raged across the region, media and citizens captured remarkable and frightening scenes of flames and smokeengulfing grasslands,villages, androadways.The view from above has been similarly dramatic.”

Meteorologists from around the world credit an area of low pressure near Mongolia fanned the flames so much that it sent smoke well into the middle and uppertroposphere. There,strong upper-level winds dispersed it widely and sent the smoke over the Pacific Ocean.